Hiroe Saeki (b. 1978, Osaka, Japan) creates drawings that inhabit the threshold between the visible and the invisible, where wonder, fragility, and mystery converge. Working primarily with sharpened mechanical pencils on paper, she produces monochromatic compositions of microscopic precision and expansive stillness. Each work functions as a meditation in which absence becomes as expressive as presence.
Her imagery recalls the organic intricacy of natural and mineral forms—lotus blossoms, spider webs, geological strata—emerging through countless minuscule lines. Often beginning with ink-blotted shapes, Saeki allows abstraction to guide the appearance of figurative motifs. The result is a body of work that contemplates time, space, and the cycle of life and death.
Deeply rooted in traditional Japanese aesthetics, her practice echoes kacho-ga (“bird and flower”) motifs while infusing them with contemporary sensitivity. Expanses of white paper counterbalance her dense, rhythmic line work, inviting viewers into a space where past, present, and future coalesce.
Her work has been exhibited widely in Japan and internationally, with presentations at the Hara Museum of Contemporary Art and The National Art Center, Tokyo. She received the VOCA Encouragement Prize in 2006, and her drawings are held in prominent collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the UBS Art Collection, London; Swiss Re, Switzerland; and the Deutsche Bank Art Collection, Frankfurt.