SAGAKI KEITA: DRAWINGS OF A THOUSAND PARTS

Sagaki Keita was born in 1984 in Ishikawa, Japan and is currently based in Tokyo. From an early age, he took an interest in Mandala art, which are typically complex drawings involving patterns and fractals based out of Hindu or Buddhist tradition. He embraced his unique style and pursued his passion in illustration, graduating from Fukushima University in 2006 and completing his master program in Art education in 2008. 
Sagaki Keita held his first solo exhibition in Hong Kong, at the Fabrik Gallery. Seven of his drawings were displayed. The theme for these works were recreations of pieces by famous Baroque artists, including Rembrandt, Carvaggio, and Vermeer, but with Keita’s unique spin.
Keita’s works are “reconstructions” of existing pieces, utilizing thousands of smaller sketches that compose the main focal point of the drawing. Keita states that he attempts to explore three concepts with all of his work:
He applies the concept of “whole and part”: composing a larger whole, out of thousands of tiny parts that may have no relation to each other whatsoever. He also largely applies the concept of opposing concepts, for example, life and death, or Japanese and western art. He attempts not to juxtapose them to highlight their opposition, rather, to complement each other and show that opposing ideas can in fact coexist. His final concept is that of change in perspective. The familiar scenes he draws completely change when we shift our perspective from the larger idea to the smaller, minute details that he freckles his drawings with. 
His work is particularly interesting because the image he is “reconstructing” is an extremely faithful recreation, yet the smaller sketches that the image is composed of are often just that—sketches. They are not refined nor polished, and may be (respectfully) compared to the disorganized scrawlings one may find in a college notebook. 
Sagaki Keita’s works may be drawn on large pieces of paper, but the true art is the hours upon hours of work that goes into meticulously building a scene out of thousands of images, some of which require a magnifying glass to properly view, which is why we decided to include the art of Sagaki Keita in our Micro Art Gallery.