“Light House”, 2025 oil on canvas 131x 161cm (100号)
GARDE Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President & CEO: Kenji Muro), a global provider of comprehensive interior design, consulting, and coordination services, present a solo exhibition by contemporary artist Oscar Oiwa, who is based in New York and active internationally, at the 20th edition of Japan’s largest art fair, Art Fair Tokyo 2026. Titled “Harvest of Light — Cultivating the In-Between / Boundaries Cultivated,” the presentation will explore Oiwa’s ongoing artistic inquiry into the spaces and boundaries that exist between cultures, perceptions, and environments.
GOCA by Garde is GARDE’s first overseas art gallery, showcasing a diverse range of works including paintings, sculptures, and ceramics, with the aim of introducing Japanese and Asian artists to the world. It seeks to become a new cultural hub for promoting contemporary art from Japan and Asia on a global scale.
This exhibition centers on works featuring motifs such as rice paddies, a quintessential Japanese landscape, and food—including bento boxes and street stalls—rooted in everyday life. Through these subjects, the exhibition presents the theme of “boundaries” or “in-between spaces,” a concept that Oscar Oiwa has explored for many years. Drawing on his experiences moving across multiple cultural spheres—Brazil, Japan, and the United States—Oiwa unfolds a distinctive worldview in which cultures, memories, and landscapes intersect.
Highlights of this exhibition
Born in 1965 in São Paulo, Brazil, to Japanese parents, Oscar Oiwa is now based in New York, following a period of residence in Tokyo. Oiwa defines the practice as that of an “artist in-between worlds.” Growing up between the distinct cultures of Brazil and Japan fostered a unique sensitivity to contrast and hybridity.
For Oiwa, who studied architecture and urban planning, landscape is not merely a backdrop. Seemingly familiar scenes contain subtle distortions where nature and architecture, reality and imagination, seamlessly intersect.
At the center of this exhibition is the large-scale work “Paddy Field” (2023), measuring over two meters wide. In this piece, the geometric grid of rice paddies carved by humans into the earth transforms into an overwhelming “matrix of light,” where memory and nature intersect.
Works such as “Hell’s Kitchen 2” and “Light Shop 4” express Oiwa’s signature coexistence of humor and unease through everyday motifs like food stalls and bento boxes. By subtly transforming ordinary scenes into something almost impossible, these works create spaces that invite viewers to reconsider their relationship with the environments encountered in daily life.
Visitors are invited to experience “Harvest of Light,” a body of work born from cultivating the fertile ground of “boundaries” as Oiwa moves across cultures and geographies, ultimately fixing the fruits of that exploration onto canvas.
“Paddy Field”, 2023, oil on canvas, 111 x 227 cm
“Hell’s Kitchen 2” , 2023, oil on canvas, 101.5 x 137.7 cm
Light Shop 4, 2024, oil on canvas, 137 x 101.6 cm
Exibition Overview
Title: Harvest of Light ― Subtitle: Cultivating the In-Between
Dates: March 13 (Fri) – March 15 (Sun), 2026
Venue: Tokyo International Forum [Galleries: N067] GOCA by Garde
Address: 3-5-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan
Admission: 1-Day Pass: ¥5,000 / Pair Pass: ¥9,000 / Season Pass (All-Access Pass): ¥8,000
Hours: 11:00 AM – 7:00 PM (March 15: until 5:00 PM) *Last admission 30 minutes before closing
Official Website: https://artfairtokyo.com
Artist Profile
Oscar Oiwa
Born in São Paulo, Brazil, in 1965. After graduating from the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism at the University of São Paulo in 1989, Oiwa moved to Tokyo in 1991 and has been based in New York City since 2002. Oiwa’s diverse practice encompasses drawing, painting, large-scale installations, and public art, with more than 200 exhibitions worldwide, including over 60 solo shows. Major venues include the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo, the National Museum of Fine Arts, Rio de Janeiro, and the Maison de la Culture du Japon à Paris. Oiwa is also internationally recognized in the field of public art. In 2025, the permanent mosaic mural “Woodside Window” was completed for the New York City Subway (MTA).
In recognition of these achievements, Oiwa received the Medal with Blue Ribbon in 2019. Numerous international grants and fellowships have also been awarded, including support from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.
Official Website:https://www.oscaroiwastudio.com/
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