Koichi Sato is a self-taught painter whose practice revolves around the multicultural landscape of New York City. Unwaveringly cheerful, Sato’s portraits run the gamut of Americana: history, music, and sports feature prevalently due to the source material of Sato’s paintings and drawings coming largely from images in vintage magazines. The visual language of bright and inviting color, coupled with a focus on pattern and linework give the portraits a sense of motion and sound. The subjects’ many fingers and rolling eyes contribute to a sense of surreal ecstasy, a moment of beauty accessible only through an imperfect relay of information.

Sato has been the subject of solo exhibitions at NANZUKA in Tokyo, Jack Hanley in New York and East Hampton, Bill Brady Gallery in Miami, Woaw in Hong Kong, and the Hole, New York. Selected group exhibitions include Bortolami, New York; Stems Gallery in Brussels; Global Pop Underground at Parco Museum, Tokyo; Punch at Jeffrey Deitch in both Los Angeles and New York; and Galerie Nagel Draxler in Cologne.