Akira Chinen, Peru

​Akira Chinen (1982), is a Peruvian Nikkei artist and art teacher based in Lima, Perú. He studied drawing and painting at Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes del Perú (the National School of Fine Arts of Peru), graduating with a “Gold Medal in Drawing Specialty”, and Art History at San Marcos University. 

Akira uses drawing as a primary medium for his work, where he not only creates volume and atmospheres, but also achieves a sense of spirituality in the viewer through the repetition of short delicate lines. Growing up as part of two distinct cultures, Peruvian and Japanese, made him meditate about his identity from an early age. He now uses art to talk about his origins, mixing icons and stories about creation myths to explain how we ourselves are those stories. In his last solo exhibition, he worked around the Koan Zen: “What is your original face before your parents were born?” to talk about identity and transcendence. 
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His work has been exhibited in six solo exhibitions and various group shows in Lima, Berlin, Limoges, Valencia, California and Miami.