Kojun

Japanese Contemporary Art by Kojun - VM 12 Wall-Gazing, The Cloisters

2019

Kojun is a self-taught American multimedia artist born in 1977 who lives and works in Tokyo, Japan. Working on his life experiences in Japan and building on his original university studies focusing on Japanese society, religion, and aesthetics, Kojun’s work explores the experiences of beauty glimpsed in everyday life. Having focused at university on Japanese society, religion, and aesthetics, he returned to his studies in Japan to pick up threads from Zen spirituality, Japanese aesthetics and the conception of mono-no-aware: the transient beauty of the ever-changing world. He continues to expand his perspective with resonant ideas from other traditions such as Daoist, Stoicism, and Neoplatonic philosophy. In these explorations, he has found all pointing in a certain direction: Showing a way forward by awakening to the beauty in every moment. Moving into visual expression in multiple media starting in 2019, this way of thinking is expressed in his artist’s name Kojun, written using characters conveying the idea of illuminating and enriching the soul. He seeks to engage with soul-enriching experiences of beauty in everyday moments. Realized in a variety of media, the pieces he creates are meant to serve as tools for the heart, objects for contemplation as markers on the path to illumination.