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Space Travelling Skulls

The Blood Spattered Whimsy of Kensei Yabuno

By NATHAN BENNETT

Title: Untitled
Artist: Kensei Yabuno
Gallery: TBA
Medium: Acrylic on cloth
Price: $500

Japanese painter & designer Kensei Yabuno paints like a little Hieronymus Bosch in short trousers who isn’t afraid of God.

I’ve never actually met the little fella, but my mental image of him is in some tiny Tokyo home studio that’s crammed to the ceiling with various ephemera—all perfectly in place.

In my head, he’s wearing his favourite pyjamas and sipping a big steaming mug of cocoa, brush in hand and listening to Earth while he throws down space-travelling skulls, fire breathing intestines and blood spattered bats onto big swathes of fabric. Cute, eh?

Kensei started painting on cloth a couple of years ago while at Camberwell College of Art in London and then progressed to hand painting T-shirts, hoodies and, most recently, the artwork for my band’s latest album, The Great Outdoors.

At the moment he’s working on a show window for Tokyo department store Hankyu Hyakka Ten while future projects include seeking planning permission to design a public park.

Recently I asked him why the Japanese always look so damn good and he replied, “Do we look truly so?”

NATHAN BENNETT
Nathan’s the singer in a band called Bridge And Tunnel. They got Best Album Cover Of The Month in the last issue.