NONCHELEEE's music is heavily underlined with elements of ska, reggae, dub, and dance hall music, which originates from Jamaica. The artist who took an interest in reggae music and culture as an adolescent is now a performing musician in Japan while also conducting a weekly radio station, "HOT Radio" for the past two years. The artist's work manifests his close relationship with music.
TUNE FI TUNE signifies reggae musicians taking turns to complete each verse to the tune on the selector. In this solo exhibition, NONCHELEEE presents five years of archive along with new works, where active handling of his shifting techniques is apparent. The artist formed the ON AIR Creative Studio in 2017 with KYNE and continues to produce illustration based commercial design and t-shirts, publish books and release cassette tapes. This working environment drives the artist to continually experiment with various techniques and materials such as risograph, markers, airbrushes, ink, silkscreen, and painting.
NONCHELEEE observes people's behaviour and facial expressions to stage humorous scenes within the work. His work portrays music in everyday life, absurd situations, and conversations. Ludicrous episodes drawn with his unique touch makes the viewers laugh. In the 2018–2019 solo exhibition House For Sale, NONCHELEEE exhibited and published 15 drawings based on the impressions and characteristics he received from Nicaragua's architecture. After discovering human-like personalities in buildings captured over time, the artist used it as the motif to link together the 'House' series. Animals and plants, building structures, which used to exist only as a backdrop in NONCHELEEE's work in the past, radiate a variety of sentiment and ambience through his point of view.
Press release courtesy Whistle.
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