Your Botticelli
The Spring Gale and the Sigh of Venus Listen, you. Yes, you, sitting there staring blankly at the sky, so desperately lonely it seems there’s no saving you. Won’t you turn this way for a moment […]
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Your Edward Hopper
On the Luxury Named Urban Solitude Listen to me, you. Yes, you, right there. At this very moment, aren’t you indulging in that spoiled, sentimental notion that you are the loneliest person in th […]
Your Albrecht Dürer
On Your Loneliness, and Its Quiet Neighbor Ah, you. You are standing all alone again today, aren’t you? Carrying a loneliness you can tell no one, in the corner of a dim room, or perhaps in the dead c […]
Your Hieronymus Bosch
To You, Who Keeps Missing the Tail of Happiness Oh, enough with the furrowed brow! You are doing yourself a disservice. That beautiful face of yours is going to waste. Come a little closer, won’ […]
Piero della Francesca
The Colors of Happiness, or on Noble Silence Hey there, you. Yes, you. I’m talking to you—the lonely soul tracing these characters with a faint, restless expectation, perhaps seeking some form of salv […]
Kandinsky: A pioneer of abstract painting
The Colors of Happiness, the Tremors of the Soul Look here, you. Won’t you lend me your ear for a moment? No, no, there is no need to be so formal. Just settle yourself into that chair over there and […]
Your Mondrian
A Bustling Solitude Named Abstraction My dear friend, would you mind indulging me in a bit of a monologue? I don’t intend to lecture you on anything difficult. It’s just that, while staring out the wi […]
Roy Lichtenstein
The Happy Lie in the Mirror If you have picked up this text to distract yourself from the boredom of the moment, or perhaps to find some decisive salvation in your life, I must say you have made an ex […]
The painter René Magritte
The Chromatics of Eternal Strays Oh, how tedious it all becomes, doesn’t it? Why does this world insist on standing before us with such a flat, expressionless face? We wake in the morning, wash […]
Rubens, the Emperor of Painters
Ah, you. Yes, you, with that somewhat restless yet deeply earnest gaze, my dear, lovable friend. Would you mind relaxing your shoulders for a moment and indulging me in this rambling tale? This is a s […]
Rembrandt, a leading painter of the Baroque period.
Hey there, you. Yes, you, the one reading these words right now. Do you happen to know a man by the name of Rembrandt van Rijn? A man who bears that somewhat worn-out, yet strangely imposing title: &# […]
The painter Frans Hals
Dear friend, I hope you can understand the sheer joy I feel in taking up my pen to compose this “prescription for happiness” specifically for a precious soul like you. Are you, perhaps, fe […]
Klimt, a leading Austrian painter
Ah, it is no use. I simply cannot bear it anymore. Why is this world so cold toward things that are too beautiful? Or perhaps, knowing that such beauty is a poison, people deliberately avert their eye […]
The painter Egon Schiele
My dear soul, you, with that look on your face as if you have no place to rest your spirit. Please, stop that. When you look like that, it makes me want to start tracing my own shadow with my fingerti […]
Tawaraya Sōtatsu, a Rinpa school painter
Ah, my apologies. The weather was simply too fine, and I’ve gone and overstayed my welcome. I’m sure you’re quite fed up by now with this aimless soliloquy of mine. No, no, there’s no need to apologiz […]
A master born in Spain
Oh, my dear friend, why such a deep furrow in your brow? What could you possibly be peering at with such intensity? Ah, an art book. And Francisco de Goya, no less. You’ve chosen a potent, heart-scorc […]
“Tsugaru” – Dazai Osamu’s masterpiece
Ah, it is truly unbearable. This world we live in—how did it become so suffocating, yet so slovenly, like the unsettling smile of an aging lady who has applied far too much powder? I sit here at my de […]
The genius of Shuji Terayama
Oh, goodness, what a truly extraordinary thing it is. In this world, there exist certain feverish presences that one simply cannot avoid. I wonder, do you happen to know the true nature of such a thin […]
A person abandoned in their hometown
Greetings. In this world of ours, so blunt and crude that it feels as if people walk about purposefully trampling roadside dandelions with their heavy military boots, I wonder if you, too, are still l […]
The loneliness of Tsuguharu Fujita
Ah, truly, why is this world so clamorous, yet at the same time, so unfathomably lonely? Don’t you think so, too? Just stop for a moment and gaze at your own shadow. There, you will find a strange voi […]
Painter of the Night
Hey there, you. Won’t you sit there for a moment and listen to my trivial, yet world-shakingly important story? Outside, it is raining cats and dogs. It’s as if the heavens have overturned a mas […]
About the painter Caravaggio
Oh, no, you must not. Please, do not stand there with such a furrowed brow, looking as though you’ve shouldered all the misfortunes of this weary world. You resemble a philosopher staring at a single […]
The Blue Fire of Edo: A Monologue on Suzuki Kiitsu
Oh, look at you, staring at me with such wide eyes! Whatever is the matter? Do I sound like I’m mimicking someone? No, don’t say a word. I can see right through to the bottom of your heart, as c […]
Sakai Hōitsu, an Edo Rinpa painter
Sakai Hoitsu was a man so vividly, almost frustratingly, sophisticated that he might leave someone like you feeling utterly bewildered. To a backwoodsman like me, one who is useless whether boiled or […]
Fra Angelico, Dominican friar
Oh, dear me, what a thing to contemplate! Is it truly possible for “purity” to exist in this world, rolled out before us in such a cruelly naked state? Tell me, are you familiar with a man […]
Kitagawa Utamaro, a representative painter of Ukiyo-e.
Kitagawa Utamaro. Just uttering the name somehow stains the air of the room with the faint scent of white face powder, or perhaps makes one feel as if their fingertips have brushed against a piece of […]
The painter Mary Cassatt
Ladies and gentlemen, I beg you not to laugh as you listen. Or rather, I don’t mind if you laugh, but I wish to speak a little of a truth so commonplace that everyone overlooks it—the fact that the tr […]
Delacroix: A leading painter of Romanticism
Oh, it’s simply unbearable. Why must passion drag a person’s heart through the mud, only to stand there afterward with such a nonchalant, composed face? Tell me, everyone—do you know the man called Eu […]
Ingres, a genius painter of Neoclassicism
Oh, let me speak for a moment about this fellow named Ingres. What comes to mind when you hear his name? Perhaps nothing at all. If that is the case, it matters not one bit. However, one must, at leas […]
Jan van Eyck, the father of oil painting
There was once a time when people believed that another world existed behind the looking glass, captured in perfect resolution. It is similar to how we stare at high-definition smartphone displays tod […]