Tide Pool

Otherwise Gallery is pleased to present Tide Pool, a solo exhibition by Ryo Uchida. Since his previous solo exhibition at the gallery in 2024, Uchida has continued to explore new directions in his practice, increasingly embracing the chance occurrences and shifts that emerge through the process of making.

In his recent works, brushstrokes appear more prominently than before, and the ways in which symbolic forms are rendered have expanded in range. In the past, Uchida often struggled with the way colors and shapes on the surface might resemble something specific or become entangled in larger meanings. Recently, however, his approach has shifted toward working alongside the images and sensations generated through such metaphorical functions.

The exhibition title Tide Pool refers to the small ecosystems formed when seawater remains in depressions in rocks after the tide recedes. Within these pools, there is a sense that something is quietly alive, even if it cannot be clearly identified. For Uchida, this phenomenon resonates with memories from his childhood and has become a point of departure in his practice.

When different elements encounter one another by chance and begin to form relationships, unexpected images emerge on the surface. In this exhibition, the process of such transformation itself quietly comes into view. We invite you to experience this new body of work that reflects Uchida’s current practice.

On the occasion of the solo exhibition Tide Pool
by Ryo Uchida

After the rain, when I come across a puddle, I sometimes find myself staring into it, as if something might be swimming inside. Each time, it brings back memories of playing along the shore when I was a child.

When the seawater that rushes in at high tide recedes, small depressions in the rocks along the coast become tide pools. Looking into them, you can see the creatures left behind, quietly moving about. In that small space cut off from the sea, things that happened to be there together measure their distance from one another and continue to live side by side. It can look like a miniature of the beautiful ocean, yet at the same time it feels slightly mismatched, almost like an imitation.

When I pour generous amounts of water and paint onto a blank white canvas, I become the repeating waves, the hollow in the rocks, the creatures moving within it, the observer gazing with curiosity, and the ocean stretching endlessly beyond. These transformations are not meant to depict something predetermined, but to allow for sudden appearances and unexpected encounters. They are repeated again and again, waiting for the moment when ground and figure quietly exchange places, like sea and land shifting with the tide.