NEW YORK, NY.- Nancy Margolis Gallery presents a two-person exhibition of Anne Canfield and Hiro Sakaguchi on view April 2 through May 9, 2015. Partners, Anne Canfield and Hiro Sakaguchi live and work in Philadelphia, PA. Anne Canfield paints interior and exterior landscapes and is exhibiting a new series of small paintings, the largest being 12” square. Hiro Sakaguchi, uses thin layers of pastel washes with line drawings to depict themes playful, and fictional.

Hiro Sakaguchi’s work is influenced by two diverse cultures, Japan where he grew up, and the US, where he now resides. The paintings depict autobiographical elements, a blend from everyday life and memory, creating a story in which emotions linger and depart. Line, the bone structure of the work, gives identity and character to the paintings and stories. Pastel blues and pinks dominate the composition, a swirling universe filled with make belief and playfulness caught in the middle of an uncontrollable whirlwind of planes, robots, teddy bears, flying objects. The child-like fantasy, figuration and color, is a purposeful contrast to Sakaguchi’s themes such as man versus nature, and war. These paintings the mix of memory, dreams, fantasy, and reality make Sakaguchi’s paintings an exciting and revealing portrait of the artist and his inner world.

Anne Canfield paints and draws on a tiny intimate scale inspired by the detail of naturalism. Starting with a tight drawing, often working from a memory, an image or an element of film, Canfield creates a narrative that reveals a solitary place or quiet moment. Following the most time intensive part of the process, the initial drawing, the painting begins.. Canfield favors an appealing palette of bright, saturated color, adding a dreamy quality to the domestic scenes and landscapes. These jewel-like paintings, in spite of their diminutive size, command attention equal to a much larger work, each becoming a small window captivating the viewer into a magical world.

HIRO SAKAGUCHI lives and works in Philadelphia, PA. He received his MFA in 1996 from Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art and BFA in 1993 from the University of Arts in Philadelphia. This is Sakaguchi’s second time exhibiting with Nancy Margolis Gallery, his first being in 2014 summer group show, FLOWERING. He has exhibited paintings in a number of galleries throughout the United States including the PULSE Art Fair Miami and the Melbourne Art Fair Australia both with Tokyo’s Mizuma Art Gallery. He is represented by Seraphin Gallery Philadelphia and Galerie Heubner & Heubner Frankfurt. Artworks by Sakaguchi can be found in both public and private collections internationally, including the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Woodmere Art Museum.

ANNE CANFIELD received her BFA from Moore College of art and Design in 1999 and attended Yale summer School of Painting and Music in 1998. Currently, she lives and works in Philadelphia. Numerous museum and galleries have included Canfield in prominent solo and group exhibitions, including Woodmere Art Museum, Delaware Art Museum, Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and the Philadelphia Museum of Art.