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Biography

New York-based painter Hiroshi Senju (b. 1958, Tokyo) is renowned worldwide for his sublime waterfall and cliff images, which are often monumental in scale. He combines a minimalist visual language rooted in Abstract Expressionism with elements of traditional Japanese painting. 

 

Hiroshi Senju was the first Asian artist to receive an Honorable Mention Award at the Venice Biennale (1995), and has participated in numerous exhibitions including The New Way of Tea, curated by Alexandra Munroe, at the Japan Society and Asia Society, New York, 2002; Paintings on Fusuma at the Tokyo National Museum, 2003; and Frontiers Reimagined at the Venice Biennale, 2015. In 2021, Senju produced a monumental, site-specific fluorescent waterfall installation for the Art Institute of Chicago. It was on view for eight months in a gallery in the Asian wing designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Tadao Ando. The 50-foot wide folding screens are now part of the museum’s permanent collection. In 2023 two of the artist’s waterfall paintings were installed in the United States Embassy in Tokyo. Among his many honors, Senju was awarded the Foreign Minister’s Commendation from the Japanese government for contributions to art in 2017, and in the same year, was honored with the Isamu Noguchi Award.
 
Notable public installations include seventy-seven murals at Juko-in, a sub-temple of Daitoku-ji, a Zen Buddhist temple in Japan, and multiple monumental waterfalls at Tokyo International Airport (Haneda). The Benesse Art Site of Naoshima Island houses two large-scale installations.
 
The artist’s monumental cliff and waterfall paintings for the Kongobuji Temple at Koyasan—a UNESCO World Heritage Site and sacred Buddhist monument—traveled to museums throughout Japan before being consecrated and installed in 2020. Assouline released a lavish coffee-table volume featuring 100 color photographs documenting this historic project in 2022.
 
Senju’s work is in the permanent collections of the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Brooklyn Museum, New York; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri; the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto; the Museum of Modern Art, Toyama, Japan; the Yamatane Museum of Art, Tokyo; Tokyo University of the Arts; and the Kushiro Art Museum, Hokkaido. In 2009, Skira Editore published a monograph of his work titled Hiroshi Senju. The Hiroshi Senju Museum Karuizawa in Japan opened in 2011.
 
Hiroshi Senju lives and works in New York

Tokyo, Japan
Acquisition
Tokyo, Japan
Paintings by Hiroshi Senju acquired for the American Embassy

We are pleased to announce that two of gallery artist Hiroshi Senju’s works, Waterfall and Waterfall on Colors, 2023, were acquired by Art in Embassies in 2023 for the American Embassy in Tokyo.

London
Museum Acquisition
London
Victoria & Albert Museum

We are pleased to announce that gallery artist Hiroshi Senju’s work, Waterfall on Colors, 2023, is now part of the museum’s permanent collection.

Assouline has released a lavish coffee-table volume featuring 100 color photographs of the Kogobuji Temple atop Japan’s Mount Koya and the monumental cliff and waterfall paintings Hiroshi Senju created for the sacred site.The book is a tribute to both Hiroshi Senju and Kūkai, the Japanese Buddhist monk credited with founding the Shingon sect of Buddhism. 

Chicago
Museum Exhibition
Chicago
HIROSHI SENJU AT ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO

Hiroshi Senju's work is on view at the Art Institute of Chicago from November 13, 2021 to June 26, 2022.

 

 

 

JAPAN
News
JAPAN
HIROSHI SENJU SELECTED FOR THE JAPAN ACADEMY PRIZE

In recognition of his work, Hiroshi Senju was recently honored with the 77th Imperial Prize and the Japan Art Academy Prize. 

 

Mount Koya, Japan
News
Mount Koya, Japan
Hiroshi Senju Dedication Ceremony at Kongobuji Temple

Hiroshi Senju is honored at the dedication ceremony celebrating the permanent installaiton of two monumental paintings he created for Kongobuji Temple at Mount Koya in Japan.

New York
Museum Exhibition
New York
Hiroshi Senju at the Brooklyn Museum

Hiroshi Senju’s work is on view in the museum’s newly renovated Asian Gallery.

Kobe, Japan
Museum Exhibition
Kobe, Japan
Hiroshi Senju at the Kobe Artists Museum & Kobe Fashion Museum

Hiroshi Senju’s work will be on view at the Kobe Artists Museum & Kobe Fashion Museum in an exhibition commemorating the completion of two monumental paintings for Kongobuji Temple at Koyasan.

Toyama, Japan
Museum Exhibition
Toyama, Japan
Hiroshi Senju at the Toyama Prefectural Museum of Art and Design Through July 29

We are pleased to announce that Hiroshi Senju’s work will be on view at the Toyama Prefectural Museum of Art and Design in an exhibition commemorating the completion of two monumental paintings for Kongobuji Temple at Koyasan. The temple is a sacred site in Japanese Buddhism, founded by the priest Kobo Daishi/Kukai in the early Heian era and a UNESCO World Heritage site. The works—a waterfall and a cliff—were commissioned to celebrate Koyasan’s 1,200th anniversary. Click here for more information.

New York
Museum Exhibition
New York
Hiroshi Senju at the Metropolitan Museum On view until January 21, 2019

We are pleased to announce that due to popular demand Hiroshi Senju’s Shrine of the Water God is again on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is part of the exhibition The Poetry of Nature: Edo Paintings from the Fishbein-Bender Collection. The pair of six-panel, twelve-foot screens, part of the museum’s permanent collection, is installed in Gallery 230 of the museum's Asian Art Galleries. 

Los Angeles
Museum Exhibition
Los Angeles
WORK BY MIYA ANDO AND HIROSHI SENJU AT THE LOS ANGELES COUNTY MUSEUM OF ART

Work by gallery artists Miya Ando and Hiroshi Senju is on view in Atmosphere in Japanese Painting, Sept. 15, 2017 – Feb. 4, 2018.

 

Click here for more about the exhibition.

New York
Award
New York
Hiroshi Senju Honored by Noguchi Museum May 2017

Each year, the Noguchi Museum presents the Isamu Noguchi Award to two individuals who share Noguchi’s spirit of innovation, global consciousness and commitment to East/West cultural exchange. We congratulate gallery artist Hiroshi Senju, recipient, along with architect John Pawson, of the 2017 Isamu Noguchi Award, for his enduring commitment to these themes. The award will be presented at the Noguchi Museum's annual benefit on Tuesday, May 16.

 

Click here for more about the Noguchi benefit.

Click here for more about the award.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Museum Exhibition
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Hiroshi Senju now on view Through May 14

We are pleased to announce that The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has added Hiroshi Senju's Suijingū (Shrine of the Water God) to its permanent collection. This twelve-panel, twenty-four-foot screen is on view in Room 230 of the museum's Asian Art Galleries. 

Hiroshi Senju Honored
Award
Hiroshi Senju Honored
New York November 2016

Congratulations to Hiroshi Senju, who has been awarded the Japanese Foreign Minister's Commendation for his contributions to the deeper understanding of Japanese art around the world through his internationally recognized oeuvre. The award was presented in New York by Ambassador Reiichiro Takahashi, Consul General of Japan in New York. The Foreign Minister's Commendation is awarded annually to individuals and groups with outstanding achievements to acknowledge their contributions to the promotion of friendship between Japan and other countries and areas. 

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