SEOUL.- Gallery Delaive is pleased to announce the exhibition Ayako Rokkaku, Dreams in my Hand at the Hangaram Museum of Arts in the Seoul Arts Center featuring an overview of 16 years of collaboration with Japanese Ayako Rokkaku. The exhibition features approximately 130 original artworks collected by the Delaive family of the Netherlands, including the best of her early works for which she received international acclaim and large-scale objects.

Ayako Rokkaku. Dreams in My Hand charts the career of the world-renowned Japanese artist from its early beginnings through its more recent developments. With artworks in various mediums and scales, it highlights Rokkaku’s unique, colourful style with her signature child-like figures while simultaneously showcasing the diversity of her practice.

Rokkaku is known for her unconventional method of finger painting, in which, by applying acrylic paint with her bare hands without sketching, she improvises and develops the work organically. With no formal art training, she began painting at the age of 20 to find a way to express herself beyond words. She first came to prominence when she participated in the GEISAI Art Fair organized by Takashi Murakami's Kaikai Kiki in 2006, where she met Dutch gallerist Nico Delaive who was immediately struck by her work and offered her a studio in Amsterdam and worldwide gallery representation. Together they ventured on an artistic journey which eventually let Rokkaku to enormous popularity.

She has now been hailed as representing the next generation of Japanese artists, following in the footsteps of Yoshitomo Nara, Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama and becoming active in various parts of the world, including Berlin, Porto and Tokyo after her start in Amsterdam. Her intuitive and eye-catching style has appealed to many and amassed her a large fan base, which correspondingly made her a sought-after artist for collectors and set her a new personal sales record on the 52nd Japanese SBI Auction in 2022 with approximately 1.2 million USD and an annual turnover of 26 million USD.

Ayako Rokkaku. Dreams in My Hand brings the story of her artistic journey to the public by displaying more than 130 works, including some of the best of her early works and some top-level newer canvasses, collected by the Delaive family since 2006, such as Untitled (ARP09-043), painted on a 2-by-3-meter canvas. Additionally on display will be a selection of atypical painted objects including antique Louis Vuitton cases, LP-covers, a wooden house and the very impressive Sculpture with two ghost rabbits (2011), a 2.3-meter-high large-scale sculpture of a girl.