Apparitions Signed by Takayoshi Sakabe
First appearance in Brussels for this Japanese artist, as if emerging from a Giotto fresco
Roger Pierre Turine
Small, a gaze from beyond. The man walks his path without wasting time on the unnecessary. He speaks little, but with precision. He dances, adding a layer of mystery to his exhibition openings. And he paints. Slowly, steadily. Preparing the canvas requires as much attention as applying the paint itself. Nourished by talent, patience, and Eastern tradition, Sakabe layers resin to give depth to his images—diving into the unknown and into shadows.
Everything is finely balanced between decorum and expression, between a suspended sense of time and the present. The grand portraits signed by Sakabe depict contemporary men and women, yet are surrounded by an aura of mystery—deepened by dark hues, vacant gazes, and postures frozen in a sensitive void. The world here seems to emerge from a blurred memory or a forgotten dream. Isn't our time still yearning to rediscover what in art can still offer us a sign?
The Art of a Traveler
Twenty-eight oil paintings form this exhibition at Galerie Fred Lanzenberg in Brussels. It marks the first appearance in Belgium of a Japanese artist who has lived in Paris for several years now. As if, canvas by canvas, he aimed to compose the whiteness of a church, a haunting, barely perceptible chant—yet always present.
The artist, through his lines and earthy tones, finds the light and the fluidity of an endless memory. At times, he seems to have stepped out of an ancient fresco. Always, emotion is present in this silence that can be heard.
The painter Takahoshi Sakabe at the Lanzenberg Gallery
From one tradition to another, a painting of emergence
Curiously, regardless of the positions held by different avant-gardes or their equivalents, classical painting—meaning representational painting—still has its followers. In her reflections on the value of art, Raymonde Moulin explains that alongside an "international contemporary art," which is orchestrated in France at great expense by cultural institutions, there persists an art of singularities, often figurative, which responds to a diffuse expectation from a faithful public. This is the kind of sensibility to which the work of Japanese painter Takahoshi Sakabe belongs. Thus, it seems as if art, too, moves at different speeds, and nothing is ever fully settled.
Sakabe's work is representational in that it evokes landscapes, figures, small animals, and faces as if they were emerging from the mists of consciousness. At the same time, it is reflective of the past, while avoiding archaism—except in large portraits and bird paintings—since this Japanese artist living in Paris draws poetic substance from both Western and Eastern traditions. His distance from classical painting is marked by his unique use of material and texture, which helps the motif emerge from the edges of the canvas, developing a pictorial skin with its own rules.
A DIFFUSED OPACITY
It is very much a style, closely tied to the rough and matte texture of the work, built up in layers that make the subjects seem to emerge from a mist—giving them a dreamlike density, sometimes severely eroded, sometimes fresco-like. This surface treatment, which is not mere patina, relegates landscapes, fields, and hills from gentle France into a mysterious elsewhere, a transfigured reality that never bores due to the disintegration of form. It’s hard to say whether the elements are fading or just about to appear. With blurred but recognizable outlines, this visual memory distortion has a striking presence, especially as the material feels warm and the light seems to emanate from within. It’s a very subtle touch, paired with a deep attention to how a sleeping figure or a hamlet seems to form and fossilize in the material—this is where the best of this painting lies.
At times, the image seems nearly erased and regains its full weight only when viewed from a respectful distance. But this process of fossilization is never gratuitous—it always carries a silent emotion that only slow, contemplative observation can reveal.
Danièle Gillemon
At Galerie Fred Lanzenberg, 9 rue des Klauwaerts, Ixelles, until February 10.
Before offering him a solo show at the FIAC in Paris, Fred Lanzenberg had the great idea to present to us the recent, silent, and fluid oil paintings of the deeply poetic Japanese painter Takayoshi Sakabe.
Powerfully introspective and meditative, Sakabe’s art radiates class and distinction, without ever falling into the trap of being labeled "orientalist." Indeed, surpassing all futile categorizations, the artist masterfully handles materials and pigments, veiling almost monochrome landscapes with an enveloping mist, to be savored inwardly.
(R.P.T.)
Galerie Lanzenberg, 9 avenue des Klauwaerts, Brussels.
Until October 6, Tuesday to Saturday, 10 AM to 12:30 PM and 2 PM to 7 PM.
art & culture
EXHIBITION | GALERIE FRED LANZENBERG
The Soothing Paintings of Takayoshi Sakabe
The artist, born in Japan, lives and works between Paris and Istanbul — a striking change of scenery.
An exhibition of Takayoshi Sakabe’s work offers a thoughtful spirit the opportunity to encounter other cultures while remaining deeply rooted in the original soil. His current showing at the Lanzenberg Gallery is nothing short of a precious gift. Rare are the exhibitions that offer such a subtle delight — an atmosphere floating over canvases entirely steeped in meditation. Presented at the FIAC in Paris in 1983, the artist quickly achieved success. Perhaps too quickly, as his work then fell into obscurity for many years. Today, having matured, Sakabe has returned to a path of reflection, and his artistic message is clear.
He gives the impression of painting from elsewhere — a silent world dusted with mist. Everything is calm, and time seems to have no hold on this universe governed by fragments of memory. One thinks of views of Mount Fuji that inspired Monet’s series of haystacks and poplars. The work is pure. The colors are both luminous and subdued, unfolding in tones of green and gray suspended in the air. The lines slowly outline the forms, pushing the essence toward a Zen space of meditation, where the visible meets the invisible, “creating a mirror effect where the gaze, imperceptibly, drifts to the other side through slow sedimentation.”
The artist paints exclusively in oil and spends considerable time preparing his canvases with casein. The material is superb and carefully considered down to the centimeter, playing with fullness and emptiness, forms and non-forms. The gaze hesitates to leave these ethereal landscapes fading into infinity, these tormented tree trunks seemingly drawn with a pen, whose spectacle is calming. A few faces with defined contours evoke sleeping women.
Several still lifes of flasks and fruits broaden Sakabe’s range of subjects. Here too, one senses his refined brushwork and technical mastery. But it is his perception of nature and limitless spaces that leaves the greatest impression. Their language is one of breath; their silence, a lesson in wisdom.
Colette Bertot
Of Moon and Rain
Sakabe, with an intense interiority
Before the FIAC in Paris, gallerist Fred Lanzenberg presents the latest works by Takayoshi Sakabe
There is the Japan of Tokyo—of manga and kitsch, of overcrowded streets and erotic centers. Takayoshi Sakabe, born in 1953 in Numazu, prefers a deeper Japan: one of countryside and mountains inhabited by the spirits of foxes and natural forces. In his Paris studio, he evokes this more inward Japan—a Japan threatened by silence, deprived of sunlight and scent. Calm to the point of trembling. A ghostly Japan, covered in mist and fog, where the appearance of whitish streaks atop ridgelines signals the exact presence of daylight.
Patiently, like a long prayer, the painter colors this desire, hidden beneath coarse layers of earth and the harsh breath of storm. Barely a dark tree or the black line of a path pierces the opacity. Sometimes, a tuft of soft green or yellow vegetation appears, fleetingly. Nothing glitters; everything breathes. Almost dazzling, through the matter of a shadowed sky, emerges a longing—like a fruit just out of reach, an allegory of beauty forever inaccessible.
Naturally, the strong impression of suspended drawing follows the tradition of ancient painters who, with a few strokes of charcoal or minimal branches on folding screens, achieved the most with the least. These works, more than others, capture the moment within the material.
From tradition also comes the taste for panoramic or ascetic formats—narrow steles. Alongside older works, they convey a sense of minimal means and a precarious balance between density and evaporation.
Finally, there are the empty spaces—paths through mountains and valleys that increasingly conquer the space of painting. There, at the center of “Ma” spaces—once defined by ropes around temples—the gods of nature slowly begin to breathe again. One thinks here of landscapes of such seamless density that ancient samurai would contemplate them unarmed, immersing themselves in the experience of animist memory.
Guy Gilsoul
The Painter’s Word
Takayoshi Sakabe reminds us that art is not about being “spectacular.” And that’s refreshing.
Even though he exhibits widely in Japan and dreams of Istanbul, it is in his Paris studio that Takayoshi Sakabe (born in Japan, in 1953) builds, in solitude, a monumental body of work around three timeless themes: the face, still life, and landscape. Yet, although these are figurative works, the Japanese painter does not use them to tell a story, comment on an event, paint a psychology, or evoke a real place. Rather, he creates paintings that are like music—like absence.
Thus, from the trunk of a tree, so close and yet so real, only a fragment is visible. A branch, launched into the rhythm of the composition, abruptly stops, cut off by the edge of the canvas, just like the cheek of a young girl or the outline of a fruit. Here and there, pencil lines, layered over multiple coats of paint, delicately carve the void of the forms.
The work is a palimpsest: it covers, like a sheet of lead, the matte surface of the painting—surfaces that recall the silent works of the early Renaissance. The monochrome palette, reduced to a few tones, only comes alive through a single hue: an orange, a violet, or most often, an acid green that strikes like a bark in the silence of whites and rosy ochres.
In this space, emptiness is not an absence but a full-fledged component that infiltrates every stage of creation—from the preparation of the background (sometimes using gold leaf) to the final touches in casein. Hence these resonances, these ghostly appearances, and creeping mists that, by nibbling away at forms, give the light the breath of phantoms. G.G.
Takayoshi Sakabe at Lanzenberg
Born in 1953 in Japan, Takayoshi Sakabe studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and gained attention by winning the Paul Louis Weiler first prize for portraiture at the Institut de France in 1983. He was quickly noticed by Fred Lanzenberg, who saw in him not only a precise and concise draftsman but also a painter. Though not a colorist in the traditional sense, the artist impressed with the richness and depth of his nuances.
Lanzenberg exhibited his work at the Basel Art Fair and gave him his first solo show at FIAC that same year. Overwhelmed by immediate success, Sakabe, whose career has since flourished in Japan, would not exhibit again in France until 1994 at Galerie Vanuxem. His presentation in Brussels is therefore highly anticipated.
Sakabe’s world is rooted in the quiet qualities that permeate the entire history of Japanese art. He draws inspiration in the way that small poems, beginning with the ordinary, guide reflection toward the essential.
One finds fragments of faces, meadows, paths, a bush, or a hilly terrain. Drawn with extreme precision and slowness, these elements develop toward a form that remains self-contained—barely whispering. His use of color also emerges at the surface through a layering technique, not relying solely on transparency but rather favoring earth tones infused with gold.
“It is an art,” wrote Christophe Claro, “that gives us presence in the form of something constantly vanishing…”
The Trance-Like Paintings of Takayoshi Sakabe at Galerie Alice Mogabgab
It was through a butoh performance, presented during the opening reception, that Japanese artist Takayoshi Sakabeset out to offer some interpretive keys to his pictorial work. His works are on display at Galerie Alice Mogabgab until March 19.
On the walls hang “silent” canvases, inviting contemplation, showing enigmatic landscapes veiled in an evanescent gray mist. Tree foliage seems to conceal impenetrable secrets. Fragments of nude bodies appear to emerge as if from Pompeian frescoes buried beneath the ashes of Vesuvius. And then, there are the strangely ethereal sumo wrestlers, their gestures weightless and delicate, yet emanating a powerful life force entirely concentrated in the present moment.
It is precisely this “vital sensation of the moment”, transcribed in his paintings and sensed in the intensity of concentrated movement, that Sakabe demonstrated in his butoh performance during the opening night. This contemporary Japanese dance, which—through extreme slowness and gestural precision—captures the subtlest pulses of life, ultimately leading the dancer into a trance state, is, according to Sakabe, the perfect symbol of the essence of his painting practice.
Dressed in a white samurai outfit, his face and limbs dusted with white powder, holding a luminous rod in one hand and a heavy black bag in the other, the painter-dancer fully surrendered himself, for nearly twenty minutes, to “this force that takes possession of me and dictates my movements,” as he explained. This spiritual force, which also manifests “in the act of painting,” commands him to let go of everything he considers important—yet in truth, hinders his journey toward the essential. This spiritual, if not esoteric, injunction results in a liberating gesture in his performance—symbolized by the act of throwing the bag—and in his painting, a total detachment from the surrounding world, which transports him, for as long as he stands before his easel, into the hidden realms of gesture, material, and the 18 pigments that make up his unique color: that strange and subtle gray, sometimes luminous, most often misty, occasionally dusted with “purifying” white, or touched with ochre, green, or gold—but always steeped in mystery.
This mystery is sustained by the Japanese painter’s mastery of emergence and disappearance, where figures and scenes dissolve into the monochrome background of the canvas. It’s also evident in his skill at evoking the unfinished, by occasionally revealing the initial pencil sketches. And by deliberately incorporating roughness and imperfection, he creates a restrained tension visible in all his works—a tension that imbues them with a meditative aura that captivates the viewer.
Business Card (Biography)
Born in 1953 in the Land of the Rising Sun, Takayoshi Sakabe spent over thirty years living between Japan and France, where he studied fine arts. In recent years, he has divided most of his time between Istanbul, Paris, and his hometown in Japan.
He has held numerous exhibitions across Europe and in his home country, including three shows at Galerie Alice Mogabgab in Beirut. His works are part of several public collections in France and Japan, including the Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris.
Les peintures en transe de Takayoshi Sakabe à la galerie Alice Mogabgab C'est par une performance de butô, présentée au cours du vernissage, que l'artiste japonais Takayoshi Sakabe a entrepris de donner quelques clés d'interprétation de son œuvre picturale. Exposée jusqu'au 19 mars à la galerie Alice Mogabgab*. Sur les cimaises, des toiles «silencieuses» offrant à la «contemplation» des paysages énigmatiques nimbés d'une évanescente brume grise. Des feuillages d'arbres qui semblent recouvrir d'impénétrables secrets. Des fragments de nus, que l'on dirait ressurgis de fresques pompéiennes dessous les cendres du Vésuve. Ou encore, des combats de sumos étrangement éthérés, aux mouvements en apesanteur et aux gestes délicats, mais surtout dégageant une force de vie entièrement concentrée dans l'instant. C'est justement cette « sensation vitale de l'instant », retranscrite dans ses toiles, cette intensité ressentie dans la concentration du mouvement, dont Takayoshi Sakabe a fait démonstration au cours de sa performance de butô présentée le soir du vernissage. Cette danse japonaise contemporaine, qui saisit au moyen d'une extrême lenteur et précision gestuelles les plus infimes palpitations de vie jusqu'à mener le danseur dans un état de transe, est, selon lui, le symbole parfait de ce qui fait l'essence de son travail pictural. Vêtu d'une tenue blanche de samouraïs, le visage et les extrémités poudrés de blanc, tenant, d'une main, un bâton lumineux et, de l'autre, un lourd sac noir, le peintre-danseur s'est entièrement livré, durant près d'une vingtaine de minutes, à « cette force qui prend possession de (lui) et (lui) dicte (ses) mouvements», explique-t-il. Cette force spirituelle qui se manifeste «également dans l'acte de peindre» et lui ordonne de se délivrer de tout ce qu'il juge important, mais qui, en fait, entrave son cheminement vers l'essentiel. Cette injonction spirituelle, pour ne pas dire ésotérique, donne lieu, dans la performance dansée de Takayoshi Sakabe, à un... lancé de sac libérateur et, dans sa peinture, à une absence totale au monde environnant qui va le transporter, le temps passé devant son chevalet, dans les arcanes du geste, de la matière et des 18 pigments dont il compose sa couleur unique : cet étrange et subtil gris, tantôt lumineux, le plus souvent brumeux, parfois saupoudré de blanc « purificateur », ou encore de touches d'ocre, de vert ou d'or, mais toujours chargé de mystère. Un mystère soutenu par cet art du surgissement et de la disparition des figures et des scènes dans le fond monochrome de la toile que maîtrise totalement le peintre japonais. Ainsi que par cette habileté à évoquer l'inachevé en dévoilant, ici et là, les coups de crayon de l'ébauche. En jouant aussi, à coup de rugosités et d'imperfections volontaires, sur cette tension retenue, perceptible dans toutes ses œuvres. Et qui leur donne cette aura méditative qui interpelle le regard. * Galerie Alice Mogabgab, Achrafieh, immeuble Noura, 1er étage, face ABC. Carte de visite Né en 1953 au pays du Soleil-Levant, Takayoshi Sakabe a partagé sa vie pendant plus de trente ans entre le Japon et la France, où il a fait les beaux-arts. Depuis quelques années, c'est entre Istanbul, Paris et sa ville natale qu'il passe le plus clair de son temps. Il a à son actif de nombreuses expositions en Europe et dans son pays d'origine, ainsi que trois passages à la galerie Alice Mogabgab à Beyrouth. Ses œuvres font partie de plusieurs collections publiques en France et au Japon, dont celle du Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris.