James Sikes • Asian Inspired Fine Art
James E. Sikes is primarily a realist painter whose focus in on traditional images of contemporary life in Asia. His recent work has concentrated on Japan where he spent most of his 30-year stay in the region. Painting in the acrylic medium, often enhanced with collage elements of Japanese paper (washi), Sikes strives to capture everyday images that he finds compelling, some of which are giving way to more modern ways of life and slowly disappearing.
Favorite subjects include traditional architecture seen in centuries-old temples, shrines, farmhouses, teahouses, shops and inns, historic towns and villages, landscape gardens, as well as the picturesque hanamachi, the districts where geisha live, train and entertain, found mainly in Kyoto. The modern nightlife districts also appear in his work, usually in a semi-abstract style that emphasizes the riotous colors and shapes of beckoning neon signs of bars, clubs, restaurants and the like.
Highlights and Updates
The Antaido company of Tokyo placed a full page advertisement in the fall edition of the art periodical SOBI for the prints of my work the company sells in Japan. Antaido will also exhibit ten prints at the Issuido Gallery in Tokyo through May 2010.
Nov. 2009
Japanese fine art periodical SOBI, Vol. 5, "James Sikes, Promoting
Japanese Culture - Beauty Abounds in the Background of Everyday Life."
by Eiko Sugiura.
Apr. 10, 2007
St. Petersburg Times (North Pinellas), Rediscoving Beauty
in Detail, Barbara Fredricksen
Galleries of The Artist
