The Japanese-born, New York-based artist Sho Shibuya wakes early. He goes for a run of exactly 3 miles, and on the way back, picks up a copy of The New York Times from his neighborhood newsstand. He doesn't subscribe because then the broadsheet would come in a roll and that would damage the paper.
Back at home, he looks out through a small window, studies the sky, unfolds the Times – its 12 by 22 inch format, a size he compares to a typical New York apartment-sized window – and begins to paint onto the front page.
For years now, this ritual has repeated itself with a singular consistency: sunrise, run, newspaper, acrylic, color. The resulting works with their delicate gradients brushed over the day’s headlines helped make him one of the defining aesthetic chroniclers of the Covid-19 pandemic. In the years since, he has not let up.
We spoke to Shibuya about his new Artspace edition and his wider practice.
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