Hatching the Egg of Hope

For Miyazaki Kensuke, art is a way happiness with people all over the world. He sees life as a journey an answer to the question: Who am I as a person and as an artist?

I've always loved painting. During a spring break in high school, I visited Belgium for two weeks. I spent my time on the streets. People 関??? passed by seemed happy my work, even though I couldn't understand their language. I realized the power of art people together.

In college, I had a dream. I wanted people all over the world me as a great artist. After , I went to London famous.

In London, I lived and worked part-time in a guest house. I didn't have much money. No gallery accepted my paintings.

My street artist friends and I thought it was cool angry. They were expressing their anger at social injustice, and their anger was real. But I was from an ordinary family an ordinary life. I wasn't angry at all.

I was in London for two years, but still I wasn't a famous artist. I decided I had to find a different way of myself.

In London, I happened a TV program about a school for orphans and street children in Nairobi, Kenya. The children looked unhappy. I suddenly felt an urge to Kenya and paint something for those children.

It was not easy, but finally in 2006, I got to Kenya, found the school, and was able for the children. I painted an angry dragon. I was happy with it, but a teacher complained, "The children are by the dragon. Some of them refuse to school." The children thought that it was a big snake. They did not know that dragons are imaginary.

I asked them, "What would you like me to paint?" "Lions!" "Baobabs!"

I asked the children me, and we had a lot of fun painting together. According to the teachers, the children became more active than before.

That was a turning point in my career. happiness through painting in collaboration with others is my thing. I made up my mind a painting project every year in different parts of the world.

In 2011, after the Great East Japan Earthquake, I joined a volunteer group in Sendai. Because schools were , children had nothing . They looked bored. I thought my painting project might cheer them up. I started working with these children. We painted the walls of a school.

A barber in Ofunato, Iwate, asked me a sign for his shop. I not only made the sign, but I also painted his whole shop in bright colors!

I had doubts about the usefulness of my art project, but I did not want to think that art has no power in the face of disaster. Money and supplies 関??? people donate can be of great help. But together on a painting and the joy of creation can also help. People can laugh and smile even in the worst conditions.

In 2017, I found myself in Mariupol, Ukraine. A war was going on. It was a very dangerous place. People were dying every day. I saw shell holes everywhere and buildings by bombs.

Mariupol was not a safe place for an art project. But to my surprise, when I started painting, children came out of nowhere me.

We painted a big mitten. The idea is based on a popular Ukrainian story, The Magic Mitten. In the story, one snowy night, an old man drops his mitten. A mouse, a frog, a rabbit, a fox, a wolf, and many other animals climb into the mitten warm.

In our painting, you see people from all over the world the warmth of a huge mitten. It is with Easter eggs 関??? represent life and hope. Our painting shows that people's warm hearts can hatch the egg of hope and bring a peaceful life to us all.

I still do not have a clear answer to the question: Who am I as a person and as an artist? But one thing has become clear: my art has the power people "super happy."