Mika Kato

  • installation view of "Mika Kato" at Tomio Koyama Gallery Roppongi, Tokyo, 2024 ©️Mika Kato
  • installation view of "Mika Kato" at Tomio Koyama Gallery Roppongi, Tokyo, 2024 ©️Mika Kato
  • Puppy 2024 inkjet print on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper 37.5×37.5cm ©Mika Kato
  • Dove 2024 inkjet print on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper 37.5×37.5cm ©Mika Kato
  • Hickory 2024 inkjet print on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper 37.5×37.5cm ©Mika Kato
  • installation view of "Mika Kato" at Tomio Koyama Gallery Roppongi, Tokyo, 2024 ©️Mika Kato
  • 加藤美佳 ねずみのたいこ Mousedrum 2024 手作りのガラス、ジェッソ、メディウム、油彩、プラチナ箔、ビス hand-made glass, gesso, medium, oil paint, platinum foil, screws h.12.7 x w.12.3 x d.9.0 cm
  • 加藤美佳 Meet Me Halfway 2024 鍋敷として売っていた木、ジェッソ、メディウム、油彩、手作りのガラス、プラチナ箔、ジェッソパーツ、ビス wood sold as a trivet, gesso, medium, oil paint, hand-made glass, platinum foil, gesso components, screws h.15.5 x w.19.5 x d.2.5 cm
  • 加藤美佳 やまわら Mountain in Springtime 2024 手作りのガラス、プラチナ箔、ジェッソ、油彩、ジェッソパーツ、ビス、手編みのニット hand-made glass, platinum foil, gesso, oil paint, gesso components, screws, hand-sewn knits h.23.0 x w.26.2 x d.3.4 cm
  • 加藤美佳 ポケットの中にたね Seeds in My Pocket 2024 手作りのガラス、プラチナ箔、油彩、ジェッソフレーク、シリコンコーティングしたビス、手編みのニット hand-made glass, platinum foil, oil paint, gesso flakes, silicone coated screws, hand-sewn knits h.14.2 x w.14.6 x d.1.9 cm
  • 加藤美佳 ながれ星 Shooting Stars 2024 合板パネルにジェッソ、麻キャンバス、油彩、メディウム、砂 gesso on plywood panel, linen canvas, oil paint, medium, sand h.2.0 x w.40.7 x d.40.2 cm
  • cloud 2006 oil on canvas 119.0 x 175.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • installation view at Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, 2006 ©Mika Kato
  • seed 2006 oil on canvas 106.0 x 120.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • みんなのお墓 a tomb for all of us 2006 oil on canvas 117.5 × 90.0 cm © Mika Kato
  • installation view at Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, 2006 ©Mika Kato
  • riri 2006 charcoal on paper 55.0 x 78.5 cm ©Mika Kato
  • monkey 2006 charcoal on paper 53.0 x 63.5 cm ©Mika Kato
  • woo 2006 charcoal on paper 54.0 x 56.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • yuri 2006 charcoal on paper 76.0 x 55.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • ひばり Hibari 2006 mixed media h. 35.0 x w. 27.5 x d. 16.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Gossamer 2005 oil on canvas diam. 121.5 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Kanten 2005 oil on canvas diam. 121.5 cm ©Mika Kato
  • constellation 2004 oil on canvas 242.0 x 224.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Peaberry 2001 oil on canvas 235.0 x 187.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Pansies 2001 oil on canvas 235.0 x 187.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Soda 2000 oil on canvas 196.0 x 196.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • installation view from "Canaria" Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, 2000 ©Mika Kato
  • Sunrise 1999 oil on canvas 129.2 x 121.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Canaria 1999 oil on canvas 194.0 x 194.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • CREAM SODA is all I need 1999 charcaol on paper in vinyl bag mounted on cardboard 129.2 x 121.0 cm ©Mika Kato
  • Mascat 1997 oil on canvas 128.8 x 137.7 cm ©Mika Kato

Mika Kato held her solo exhibitions with Tomio Koyama Gallery in 2000, 2006, 2024.
While she was a second-year student at the Graduate School of Fine Arts, Aichi University of the Arts in 2000, Evanescent yet powerful, and rendered in oil through astonishingly meticulous brushstrokes, Kato made an impressive debut as an artist with her portraits of young girls, which were based on photographs of clay dolls that she had handcrafted herself.
Since then, she has participated in numerous exhibitions both in Japan and abroad, including solo exhibitions at Art Tower Mito (2001) and at White Cube/Jay Jopling in London (2005). In her solo exhibition at Tomio Koyama Gallery in 2006, she demonstrated a shift towards new forms of expression following the death of her beloved cat, after which she temporarily suspended her artistic practice.
However, over time, she continued to ruminate over the experiences of what she had seen and felt in her everyday life as she lived in a small forest in the Mie Prefecture with her family and dog.

With a love for nature, living things, and her family, Mika Kato has for long continued to poetically nurture her compassionate perspective. As she returns to her artistic practice, she strives to put a stop to the tendency that threatens to turn her into an imitation of her past self, and with her own hands, once again moves forward with a world and vision that seems to represent the origins of life.

1975　Born in Mie, Japan
1999　B.F.A., Aichi Prefectual University of Arts and Music
2001　M.F.A., Aichi Prefectual University of Fine Art and Music
Most Promoising Young Talent Prize, Fine Art Division of Gotoh Memorial Cultural Award
2004　Roppongi Crossing International Advisory Board Prize

Solo Exhibitions

2024 Tomio Koyama Gallery Roppongi, Tokyo, Japan
2006 Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2005 White Cube, London, UK
2001 Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito, Ibaraki, Japan
2000 “Canaria” Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, Japan

Group Exhibitions

2023 “MOT Collection: Membrane of the Time / Breathing” Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
2021 “A Nexus of Rainbows: Works from the Hara Museum and the Hara Rokuro Collections” Hara Museum ARC, Gunma, Japan
2018 “My Favorites: Toshio Hara Selects from the Permanent Collection Part II” Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
2017 “The Riddle of Art: Takahashi Collection Resonance or Repellence? ”Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
2016 “Mind Fulness Takahashi Collection 2016” The Museum of Art, Kochi, Japan
2015 “Taguchi Hiroshi Art Collection A Walk around the Contemporary Art World after Paradigm Shift” The Museum of Fine Arts, Gifu, Japan
“TAKAHASHI COLLECTION: Mirror Neuron” Tokyo Opera City Gallery, Japan
“MOT Collection Part1: Postwar Art in Close-up” The Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Japan
2014 “Takahashi Collection 2014 Mindfulness!” Nagoya City Art Museum, Aichi, Japan
“Twentieth Anniversary Special MOT Collection Chronicle 1995-” Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Japan
“Bishojo no Bijyutushi” Aomori Museum of Art, Japan; Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan Shimane Arts Center, Japan
“Taguchi Art Collection: TAG-TEN☆” Matsumoto City Museum of Art, Nagano, Japan
2013 “Wonderful My Art” Kawaguchiko Museum of Art, Yamanashi, Japan
2011 “The Most Requested Top 30/ 10 Years of Takahashi Collection” TABLOID GALLERY, Tokyo, Japan
“Taguchi Art Collection, Global New Art” Seiji Togo Memorial Sompo Japan Museum of Art, Tokyo, Japan
2010 “Garden of painting -Japanese Art of the 00s” The National Museum of Art, Osaka, Japan
“Trans-Cool Tokyo -Contemporary Japanese Art from MOT Collection” Singapore Art Museum, Singapore
2009 “In the Little Playground -Hitsuda Nobuya and his surrouding students-” Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan; Nagoya City Art Museum, Aichi, Japan
2008 “Selections from the Hara Museum's Permanent Collection” Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
“neoteny japan: Contemporary Artists after 1990s from Takahashi Collection” KIRISHIMA OPEN-AIR MUSEUM, Kagoshima, Japan; Sapporo Art Park, Hokkaido, Japan; The Niigata Prefectural Museum of Modern Art, Japan; Akita Museum of Modern Art, Japan; Yonago City Museum of Art, Tottori, Japan; The Museum of Art, Ehime, Japan
“MOT Collection” Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Japan
2007 “Selections from the Hara Museum's Permanent Collection” Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
2006 “Idol!” Yokohama Museum of Art, Kanagawa, Japan
2005 “Very Very Human” Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Aichi, Japan
“Rising Sun, Melting Moon” The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
2004 “ROPPONGI CROSSING” Mori Art Museum, Tokyo
“Mediaruna” The Govette-Brewester Art Gallery, New Plymouth, New Zealand
“Officina Asia” Galleria d' Arte Moderna, Bologna, Italy
“Fiction Love” MOCA Taipei, Taiwan
2003 “girls don't cry” Parco Museum Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan
“New Generation Japanese Painters” Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
“Japan Rising” Palm Beach Institute of Contemporary Art, Lake Worth, USA
2002 “Coloriage” Foundation Cartier pour l' art Contemporain, Paris, France
“Fragile Figures” Pallette Club, Tokyo, Japan
2001 “My Reality - Contemporary art and the Culture of Japanese Animation” Des Moines Art Center; Brooklyn Museum of Art; Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati; Tampa Museum of Art; Chicago Cultural Center; Akron Art Museum; Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach; Museum of Glass, Tacoma; Huntsville Museum of Art, USA
“CASINO 2001” Stedelijk Museum Voor Actuel Kunst Gent, Belgium

Public Collections

Hara Museum ARC, Gunma, Japan
Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, Japan
Ryutaro Takahashi Collection
S.M.A.K., Museum of Contemporary Art, Ghent, Germany
The National Museum of Art, Osaka
The Taguchi Art Collection, Japan