1965 Bom in São Paulo.
Graduated from São Paulo University,Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism.
1991 Move to Tokyo

1987 - 88 "Golden Rain Project", solo exhibition in Tokyo, Madrid and São Paulo
1991 "21st International São Paulo Biennial",São Paulo
1993 "Brazilian Art Today", Fujita Vente Museum Tokyo
1993 - 95 Solo exhibition in Skydoor Art Place Aoyama, Tokyo
1994 "FARET Tachikawa" public art project, Tokyo
1995 "VOCA 95"; Encouragement Award, Tokyo
1995 "Little Aperto", Venice
1995 Picture book "Art at first Time", from Skydoor Inc., Tokyo
1995 Solo exhibition in Yokohama Museum of Art/Art Gallery, Kanagawa
1996 "Osaka Triennale 96", Osaka.
1997 Soloexhibition in Artium Gallery, Fukuoka
1997 Studio Shokudo,Tokyo;
1997 Morphe'97, Tokyo
1997 Contemporary Art Factory, Tokyo
1997 "UnaVoz deTokyo", Galeria Metropolitana de Barcelona group show, Barcelona
1998 Solo exhibition in Contemporary Art Factory, Tokyo.

Participation in several other commission works, solo and group exhibitions.

1990 "8th Salon Paulista",São Paulo, Aquisition Prize
1995 Delfina Studio Trust One Year Rrsidence Award, London
1996 "4th Yokohama Sculpture Biennale", Yokohama, First Award
1997 Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant, NewYork.

Introducltion of artist Osear Satio Oiwa

The artist Oscar Satio Oiwa is a second generation Japanese-Brazilian bom in 1965. Two years after graduating from the architecture department, Sao Paulo University, he had a chance to participate in the Sao Paulo International Biennial, an experience that prompted him to leave his mother country and seek broader opportunities as an artist abroad. In 1991, he made Tokyo the base for his activities and almost immediately drew attention to himself, through the vigor of his involvement in creating and exhibiting. By now, he has won wide recognition in Japan as a capable artist who stands out even among the many new artists active in the nineties.

From growing up in the multiracial society of Brazil, Oscar has acquired a multicultural nature and a love for free-ranging activities that defy national borders. Then, the sharp contrast his native country offers between densely populated cities and vast regions of wilderness is Oscar's primary scenery, so to speak, and provides him with a ceaseless fountain of inspiration for artistic expression.

Oscar produced prolifically during his first years in Japan and exhibited in countless solo and group formats. Each work was backed by a thoroughly considered concept and took any one of various forms - flat surface, three-dimensional installation, and so on. In the field of painting, his highly motivated activities won him the encouragement prize at the 1995 Vision of Contemporary Artexhibition, an event that has launched many young artists into successful careers. That same year, he began a seven-month stint in London as an artist-in-residence.

Oscar has also produced numerous original ideas for art in city spaces, which is to say, for public art. In 1994, he participated as an artist in the Faret Tachikawa Publie Art Project, the largest project in Japanese public art history. In 1996, his work "Portrait of a Tree" won the grand prize in the Fourth Yokohama Sculpture Biennial. It is now established in front of a station in south Tokyo.

Along side his diverse, exuberant projects as an artist, Oscar also employs his strong bent for ideas and plans as an exhibition organizer. In 1993, he coordinated a Brazilian conternporary art exhibition and successfully introduced to Japan many Brazilian artists who were unknown here. More recently, to help younger artists, he has been involved in holding group exhibits in Venice, Barcelona, and Weimar.

Despite the varied nature of Osear's output, certain themes are ever-present. His inquiry into excessive urban development and environmental destruction; his satirical inquiry into modern art. For Oscar, the problems of a Latin American society hobbled by the contradictions that come with modernization are, in some form, the problems that bedevil all nations around the world.

Nonetheless, while Oscar's inquisitive spirit and penetrating vision move him to address profound,universal themes, his art shows no lack of humor. His playful, flowing line, radiant with warmth, and his paintings, expressed through colors of exceeding transparency, have an original spirit that continually charms us.

"Via Crucis," the title Oscar has given his solo exhibition at the Contemporary Art Factory this time, is the Latin for "Road of the Cross." This book, which views the 20th century in terms of the theme "journey," will be sent to locations around the world, based on a list Oscar has compiled. The book, itself, we might say, is intended to "journey" the world, meeting people, stimulating dialogue, and creating ripples.

The next century will no doubt see more walls crumble between nations and more mixing among cultures. Discord will increase, accordingly, and the relationship of our culture to nature may grow even more contradictory and fractured. Oscar's creative vision, though it reflects the chaos of our age, nonetheless points to a road offering a dim hope. What is demanded of us is no less than the courage to "journey" and overcome the daunting obstacles that separate nations, cultures, and indeed, civilization and nature. If we can keep that courage, then, just as Christ's journey of anguish led to a glorious resurrection, humankind and nature might once again experience resurrection, as well.

Text by Takaaki Soga, Contemporary Art Factory (Director), Tokyo, 1998 Spring