SEIZAN Gallery is pleased to present the summer group exhibition WHERE WE ARE NOT, featuring works by Yasushi Ikejiri, James Isherwood, Tom Nakashima, and Danielle Winger. On view from July 3 through August 23, 2025 (with a holiday closure from August 10 to 18), the exhibition brings together four distinct but thematically convergent practices that envision landscapes largely devoid of living beings—prompting reflection on place, memory, and the quiet traces humanity leaves behind.

 

Yasushi Ikejiri, influenced by a broad lineage of landscape painters—from the dense forest scenes of Ivan Shishkin to the solitary architecture of Edward Hopper—depicts overlooked corners of urban and suburban Tokyo with meticulous realism. His oil paintings, marked by heightened chromatic intensity and extraordinary detail, convey a hushed stillness tinged with dystopian unease. In recent years, Ikejiri has drawn inspiration from The Chocolate Candy Angel, a poignant children’s story by Mimei Ogawa (1882–1961), a pioneer of modern Japanese fairy tales. His latest works portray desolate parks and empty streets populated only by candy wrappers and discarded snack boxes—evocative remnants of absent lives that lend the scenes a quiet, melancholic charge.

 

Yasushi Ikejiri (b. 1971, Hokkaido, Japan) studied at the Toyo Institute of Art and Design and lives and works in Tokyo. His work has been widely exhibited in Japan and the U.S., including a 2024 solo show at SEIZAN Gallery New York, and has been featured in art fairs such as SCOPE Miami and VOLTA New York.

 

James Isherwood constructs architectural landscapes where human presence is implied but absent. His structures—silent protagonists—are rendered in vivid, hyper-saturated palettes that recall the traditions of Hopper and Hockney while veering into dreamlike surrealism. Through layered washes and gestural improvisation, Isherwood conjures scenes that feel at once familiar and uncanny, inviting the viewer into spaces that hover between the real and the imagined.

 

Described as a “master of deception” by Pier Luigi Sacco in Flash Art (2020), James Isherwood (b. 1971, Massachusetts) holds a BA from Parsons and lives in Brooklyn, NY. His recent solo exhibitions include SEIZAN Gallery (2024), Susan Eley Fine Art (2022), and Galeria Ana Serratosa in Valencia (2021). He is the recipient of fellowships from the Constance Saltonstall Foundation, Willapa Bay AiR, and VCCA, and his work is held in the U.S. Department of State Art Bank and various private collections.

 

Tom Nakashima works across painting, printmaking, collage, and digital media to explore landscapes shaped by memory, cultural legacy, and spiritual geography. Living presence often recedes into the background as Nakashima’s imagery foregrounds natural and architectural forms—such as tree piles and rural chapels—composed in meditative stillness. His first presentation with SEIZAN Gallery features Hanford K East (20XX), a monumental oil and collage painting inspired by a building at the Hanford Site, a decommissioned U.S. nuclear production complex along the Columbia River in Benton County, Washington. The haunting, depopulated scene reflects on the latent histories embedded in seemingly inert structures.

 

Tom Nakashima (b. 1941, Seattle, WA) has exhibited extensively across the U.S. and abroad. Recent solo shows include Terzo Piano (Washington, D.C.) and the Huntington Museum of Art. His work is currently featured in the traveling exhibition Resilience: A Sansei Sense of Legacy. His works are held in over 60 public collections, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the High Museum of Art, Rutgers University’s Zimmerli Art Museum, and the Jersey City Museum. He lives and works in Floyd, Virginia.

 

Danielle Winger paints contemplative, emotionally resonant landscapes shaped by the expressive spirit of German Romanticism. With bold brushwork and saturated hues, her works evoke mountains, forests, and deserts not just as topographical forms but as metaphors for solitude, transcendence, and inner life. Her paintings suggest that the natural world is as much a vessel for emotion and memory as it is a physical space.

 

Danielle Winger (b. 1986, Nevada) has exhibited internationally, including at König Bergson (Munich, 2025), Lamb Gallery (London, 2024), and Red Arrow Gallery (Nashville, 2021 & 2023). She is a returning presence at SEIZAN Gallery, having participated in The Shape of Water (Tokyo, 2024), Art Taipei, and Art Fair Tokyo. Her work has been featured in ArtMaze Magazine and New American Paintings Midwest #173 (2024). Winger lives and works in La Fontaine, Indiana.