MIZUKI is a Japanese self-taught artist from Tokyo, currently based in Paris since 2023.
Although she majored in International Politics at university, her lifelong passion for painting never faded, and in her mid-twenties she decided to pursue a career as an artist.

Her practice centers on the theme of identity, exploring the delicate tension between personal authenticity—“who we are”—and the forms shaped by social expectations—“how society sees us and expects us to be.”

As the first chapter of this exploration, she creates portraits of female figures composed with influences from Ukiyo-e, Ikebana, and Bonsai. These works are rooted in her own experience of navigating social expectations in Japan surrounding women’s appearance—particularly the cultural emphasis on thinness and idealized beauty—and behavior in Japan, as well as the shift in perception she experienced through her engagement with Western culture.

In Western art history, women have long been central subjects of depiction—symbols of beauty, virtue, or grace. In Japan, the genre of bijinga (pictures of beautiful women) flourished within Ukiyo-e during the Edo period (17th–19th century), when female artists were rare and women were most often portrayed through the eyes of men.

By adopting this traditional form of female portraiture in her own practice, MIZUKI seeks to connect herself to a long lineage of artistic expression while reinterpreting bijinga through her contemporary lens—transforming it into a dialogue between past and present, and between the portrayed and the one who portrays.