Biography
Kunikazu Kadota (born 1985, Gifu Prefecture) is a Japanese sculptor whose practice sits at the boundary of paper sculpture and printmaking. The slug 'kadota-norikazu' reflects an alternative reading of the kanji 訓和; the artist's own romanisation is 'Kunikazu.' He was selected for the 3rd PATinKyoto Print Art Triennale in 2022, where his work was presented as expanded printmaking rather than as conventional intaglio or relief printmaking.
Kadota graduated from the Department of Sculpture at Musashino Art University in 2009 and completed a master's degree in sculpture at Kyoto City University of the Arts in 2012. His training thus spans both the Tokyo and Kyoto art-school traditions, and he has subsequently served as a research assistant in the Sculpture Department at Musashino Art University.
Paper — its folding, arrangement, colour, and surface — is the central material of his practice. In his 'Abstract Paper' series he translates arranged paper configurations into printed images, realised as UV prints on plexiglass, so that the finished work retains a trace of the physical paper while detaching it from its original three-dimensional state. His selection for PATinKyoto situates this approach within the contemporary 'expanded printmaking' tendency in Kansai-area artist communities.
His exhibition history includes the solo shows 'OPEN STUDIO' at Sitterwerk in St. Gallen, Switzerland (2011), 'before that' at ARTZONE in Kyoto (2012), 'whereabouts' at Musashino Art University's gFAL in Tokyo (2015), and 'physical time' at Gallery PARC in Kyoto (2016), as well as the Gunma Biennale for Young Artists at the Museum of Modern Art, Gunma (2015) and the 3rd PATinKyoto Print Art Triennale at the Kyoto City KYOCERA Museum of Art (2022), where he showed work including 'Metal.'
Kadota's position within the contemporary Japanese scene is that of a Tokyo- and Kyoto-trained sculptor working at the boundary of paper, sculpture, and photographic print. His 2011 Sitterwerk residency gave him early international exposure, and the sustained practice that followed has produced a recognisable visual identity across both gallery and triennial contexts.
Key Facts
- Active Period
- 1985
- Nationality
- 🇯🇵Japan
- Movement
- Contemporary Mokuhanga
- Works Indexed
- 3
Frequently Asked Questions
Kunikazu Kadota (born 1985, Gifu Prefecture) is a Japanese sculptor whose practice sits at the boundary of paper sculpture and printmaking. The slug 'kadota-norikazu' reflects an alternative reading of the kanji 訓和; the artist's own romanisation is 'Kunikazu.' He was selected for the 3rd PATinKyoto Print Art Triennale in 2022, where his work was presented as expanded printmaking rather than as conventional intaglio or relief printmaking.
Kunikazu Kadota was active born in 1985. They were associated with the Contemporary Mokuhanga movement.
Kunikazu Kadota's work was shaped by the Contemporary Mokuhanga tradition in Japanese woodblock printmaking. Contemporary Mokuhanga: Contemporary mokuhanga (literally "wood-block print") encompasses artists working from approximately 1970 to the present who continue or reinvent traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques.
