Asami KIYOKAWA

Asami KIYOKAWA (b. 1979) explores the gap between the inner self and the external image of the individual as shaped by the media in contemporary society, where images and information are constantly circulating. Her practice examines the relationships between identity, the body, memory, and society. Focusing on images produced by various forms of media, including social media and magazines, she explores how individual psychology and social environments influence one another, expressing these dynamics through a range of media, including photography, embroidery, textiles, and digital imagery. Beginning with experiments in layering and overlapping threads on photographs, KIYOKAWA developed a distinctive technique of embroidering photographs of dolls that she has taken herself. This approach has since expanded into mixed media works incorporating books, textiles, magazines, and painting. Moving between the material and immaterial, as well as the analog and digital, she seeks to visualize emotions, sensations, and invisible worlds that often remain unseen. In particular, through the formal qualities of embroidery, its layering and interconnectedness, she explores the intersections of personal identity, memory, mythological imagination, and technology.

In recent years, KIYOKAWA has incorporated emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and virtual reality (VR) into her practice, expanding her work into video, installation, and public art. She has also presented projects that apply the formal principles of embroidery to urban spaces and social structures, reweaving them in new ways. In 2023, she oversaw the production of Our New World (Toranomon), a permanent public artwork installed at Toranomon Hills Station on the Tokyo Metro, extending her artistic intervention into the urban environment. Through collaborations across a wide range of fields, including art direction, advertising, film and music video production, product design, and regional revitalization initiatives, she continues to expand the scope of her artistic practice.

Asami KIYOKAWA was born in 1979 on Awaji Island, Hyogo, Japan. She has received the ASIAGRAPH Creator’s Award (Tsumugi Award, 2013), VOGUE JAPAN Women of the Year (2012), the VOCA Exhibition Prize (2010), and the Best Debut Award (2004). She has held solo exhibitions at MAKI Gallery (Tokyo, Japan, 2025; 2023), Kirishima Open-Air Museum (Kagoshima, Japan, 2024), MtK Contemporary Art (Kyoto, Japan, 2023), Ginza Tsutaya Books (Tokyo, Japan, 2021), ARARIO GALLERY SHANGHAI (Shanghai, China, 2019), Omotesando Hills (Tokyo, Japan, 2018), Museum "Eki" Kyoto (Kyoto, Japan, 2017), Parco Museum (Tokyo, Japan, 2014), and Art Tower Mito (Ibaraki, Japan, 2011), among others. She has participated in group exhibitions at Pola Museum Annex (Tokyo, Japan, 2026), 21_21 Design Sight (Tokyo, Japan, 2025), Play! Museum (Tokyo, Japan, 2025), MtK Contemporary Art (Kyoto, Japan, 2022), Pearl Art Museum (Shanghai, China, 2020), Al Hamriyah Studios, Sharjah Art Foundation (Sharjah, UAE, 2018), Kiyoharu Art Colony (Yamanashi, Japan, 2018), and Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum (Tokyo, Japan, 2009), among others.