FLAVIO SHIRO-TANAKA (1928 - )
Untitled

FLAVIO SHIRO-TANAKA (1928 - )

Untitled

Dated Paris in December 1980

Gouache and ink on newspaper, framed and glazed

Signed to lower centre

19cm high, 14cm wide

Flavio-Shiró Tanaka (1928 -) is one of the main representatives of abstract expressionism in Brazil. His dark and disturbing style includes elements of abstract expressionism and surrealism. His works extensively exhibited internationally feature in the permanent collections of notable museums including the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, the São Paulo Museum of Modern Art and the Fonds National d'Art Contemporain.

Born in Sapporo, Tanaka emigrated with his family to Tomé-Açu in Brazil in 1932. The experience of living in the jungle had a big influence on his formative years. In 1939 the family relocated to São Paulo to pursue better education and economic opportunities, where young painter began his artistic training. By the early 1950s he held his first solo exhibition in Rio de Janeiro. In 1953, he emigrated to Paris where he studied engraving and lithography at the Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux Arts. In the 1960s his work shifted towards an increasingly surrealistic style featuring organic shapes and nightmarish objects inspired by his childhood spent surrounded by the wild nature of the Amazon.