Tokyo-based sculptor Motomasa Suzuki, born in 1981, graduated from Musashino Art University in 2004. Suzuki assembles hand-carved wooden pieces into anonymous landscapes, spaces that belong to no one and yet, through his acute attention to scale, are transformed into infinite new worlds just for the viewer.

Suzuki’s Semi Grand Prix Art Award from Jeans Factory in 2006, juried by Ukawa Naohiro and Morimura Yasumasa, followed by his selection to show in the 11th Okamoto Taro Memorial Award for Contemporary Art Exhibition in 2007 drew attention to his unassuming and unique style. The scenes he carves out, carefully sizing each piece to scale, appear as part of some other world that he has somehow molded into a reality. His works stretch out before the viewer like any common, mundane landscape, and yet possess a character that invites us for a closer look into their world.

For this exhibit, Suzuki constructs sceneries scattered with wooden boxes and signs, places that seems at once both familiar and foreign. Despite knowing that the materials he uses are commonplace, one is left with only a feeling that this is the case.

As a response to an era in which one can access an infinite number of images instantly via the internet, Suzuki chooses to create his images through the slow process of carving wood. This presents the artist with a series of limitations which he in turn finds ways to break free from and, in doing so, opens up a world without boundaries. The objects he creates produce a curious sense of weight; there is another side to these flat surfaces, hidden to the eye, that invites a recollection of memories.

Suzuki’s work is reminiscent of building a train set, creating a personal space that brings with it a feeling of belonging and ownership. The anonymous landscape slowly unfolding within the gallery space invites us to become a part of its world, and for that world to become a part of us.

World is Yours will be on display through April 3rd, 2010.