Some male office workers with anxious and tired expressions merge with all kinds of machinery and industrial vehicles, while others coexist in oppressive spaces with insects or mutant creatures. They seem to be lost in the huge city, swallowed up in it, staring at the audience indifferently, unable to move in a dominated world.
Japanese artist Tetsuya Ishida recorded the appearance of things with extremely meticulous brushwork. From hair to stains, he rigorously depicted everything. He captured despair, emotional isolation and powerlessness, reflecting the mood of Japanese society and the working class at that time. The characters in the work seem to be trapped in a mechanically cyclical world. And Tetsuya Ishida also fabled the unease and oppression lurking in contemporary society in his short career.
Tetsuya Ishida (1973-2005) was born in Yaizu, Japan, a small city famous for fishing and processing aquatic products. His father is a local councilor and his mother is a housewife. The port city where he was born in the home port of Lucky Dragon 5. In March 1954 a fishing boat by that name was caught in the fallout of a U.S. thermonuclear test at Bikini Atoll. Those on board suffered acute radiation syndrome and one crew member died. Decades later, U.S. artist Ben Shahn published a series of works about the nuclear disaster in Yaizu. Tetsuya Ishida, who was only eight years old at the time, also received Shahn's influence and decided to become a painter in his diary. After graduating from high school, he went to Japan's famous art university - Musashino Art University to major in Visual Communication Design, his parents didn't support his pursuit of art but wanted him to have a pragmatic job, even though his artistic performance is on the rise, they still oppose his choice, and the relationship between Ishida and his parents has dropped to a freezing point.
After entering university, he refused financial support from his family, so he was quite financially difficult. By his own strength, he created while doing odd jobs and concentrated on developing his own artistic path. After leaving school, he quickly became a full-time artist.
At that time, Japan was in the "lost decade", and it happened to be the stage when Ishida also was studying at university. Japanese society was affected by both natural and man-made disasters. The intensification of the doomsday prophecy has put the whole of Japan in a state of depression. The turbulence of the environment affected Ishida Tetsuya's creation, and he felt that it reflected the helplessness and anxiety of Japan's high industrialization at that time.
The scenes created by Tetsuya Ishida are like real scenes, vividly depicting the powerlessness of the collective society at that time. Taking Japan in the 1990s facing the economic depression as his creative background, he took into account the various social problems in Japan at that time, the mechanized lifestyle of office workers, and the mediocre work every day, but they could only live in a space the size of a lunch box. The rapid pace of work in Japan forces everyone to operate like cogs. This way of mechanizing and materializing human beings, such as the hell-like examination system, overworked office workers, etc., the artist presents in a surreal way of painting, showing the heaviness and helplessness of the Japanese.
However, in 2005, Tetsuya Ishida, unfortunately, passed away in a traffic accident, ending his short artistic career at the age of 31. There are many claims that the death was caused by a tram accident, but there are also many speculations that he committed suicide because of depression. After his death, his works were introduced by many people in the art world and began to attract attention. During his lifetime, the artist did not have many solo exhibitions or participation, and his early sales were not satisfactory. In his short ten-year career, he created more than 200 paintings, including countless hand-painted drafts. Although Ishida's works mainly depict Japan in the Heisei period, they can still touch the busy modern people today, and still make people feel empathy.
Figure 1：Person Who Can No Longer Fly, acrylic on board, 1996 © Tetsuya Ishida
Figure 2 top left photo：Refuel Meal, acrylic on board, 1996 © Tetsuya Ishida
Figure 2 lower left photo：Cell Phone Robot and Laptop Boy, acrylic on board, 1996 © Tetsuya Ishida
Figure 2 Top right photo：：Whating for A Chance,1999 © Tetsuya Ishida
Figure 2 bottom right photo：：Tetsuya Ishida © Estate of Tetsuya Ishida
