AYAKO
ROKKAKU
Meet
The
Artist
“Living beings aren’t just beautiful. With all their different layers,
they become imperfect, strange, and lovable.”
– Ayako Rokkaku
“Living beings aren’t just beautiful.
With all their different layers,
they become imperfect, strange,
and lovable.” – Ayako Rokkaku
At the beginning of 2026, KÖNIG GALERIE visited Ayako Rokkaku for an intimate interview and studio visit, filmed between two sites that quietly mirror her way of working: the Nave of St. Agnes, where her exhibition SCENERY IN THE PROCESS OF BEING FORMED was on view, and her new Berlin studio—still unfinished, yet already fully alive.In the vast Nave, Rokkaku’s fourth solo exhibition with the gallery unfolded as an environment rather than a fixed display. Paintings, sculptures, glass, fabric, and ceramic works traced her movement through places and materials, showing how form emerges slowly through touch. Landscapes are not depicted but felt into being: colors drift like weather systems, surfaces carry the memory of hands, and gestures seem to settle into matter at the pace of emotion. Across the space, scenes appeared as if still forming—open, attentive, and porous.
Her Berlin studio echoed this openness. Though construction was ongoing, what mattered most was already in place: generous walls for large canvases, room to move freely, and a powerful light installation that casts daylight long into the night, enabling her to paint for hours. Large industrial windows look onto a Berlin backyard splashed with graffiti—an everyday burst of color that quietly greets the artist. Here, Rokkaku began as she always does: applying color first, letting shapes emerge gradually, guided by her body rather than by preconception.
The interview, conducted in Japanese, offers rare insight into her inner processes. Rokkaku spoke of working without mediation—hands directly in paint or clay—and of trusting sensation over intention. Her familiar figures—big-eyed girls, bunnies, clouds of color—resist easy readings of cuteness. As she puts it, “Living beings aren’t just beautiful. With all their different layers, they become imperfect, strange, and lovable.”
