Melancholy In Eden The Pensive Sirens of Sana Yoshida

Sana Yoshida (b. 1986) is a Japanese figurative artist working with oil on a panel. Her Instagram account is filled with announcements of exhibitions, and this is not surprising: the doll-like girls in her paintings are surrounded by paradise birds they've tamed, mesmerizing marine creatures, and marvelous dragons. The feast of color and Asian graphic patterns like curls of waves or flame tongues counterbalance the melancholy in the large eyes of the Eden dwellers.

Fig. 1. Sana Yoshida with her painting (facebook.com)

Fig. 2. Musubime, 2018, Oil on panel 27×16cm (Instagram.com)

Fig. 3. Evening Dream, 2021, Oil on panel 41 x 41 cm (yoshida-sana.jimdofree.com)

Fig. 4. Tropical Night, 2020, Oil on panel 45 x 38 (Instagram.com)

Fig. 5. "Fuchigen" 2022 Cotton cloth, oil on panel　45 x 38 cm (Instagram.com)

Fig. 6. Moonlight Bath (Instagram.com)

Fig. 7. Izanau, 2021, Oil on panel 41×31cm (Instagram.com)

Fig. 8. Shoyo, 2021 Oil on panel 31×41cm (yoshida-sana.jimdofree.com)

Fig. 9. Lingering Dream (Instagram.com)

Not Mere Allegories

Neither on Yoshida's social media nor on her website any personal info can be found. It’s known that at the moment, she resides in Saitama Prefecture. Since 2010, she’s held at least six solo exhibitions and participated in nearly thirty group shows. The only thing Yoshida tells about her works and artistic approach is that she projects her feelings onto the images of girls, yet, at the same time, she tries to show the physical side of her heroines for them not to be just allegories. For a long time, Yoshida had been drawing with a pen on paper, so line drawing is a technique she applies even when working with oil.

Fig. 10. Sirens, Paul Delvaux, 1979 (wikiart.org)

Fig. 11. Aurora, Mark Ryden, 2015 (artsy.com)

Surreal Similarities

What attracts the viewer to Yoshida's paintings besides her performance is a slight similarity of her girls to those from the works of European surrealists. If you like the pensive females of the Belgian surrealist Paul Delvaux (fig. 10) or the fairies of Mark Ryden (fig. 11), you'll also be charmed by their Japanese sisters, whom Yoshida skillfully brings to life on her canvases. 

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You can follow the artist on Instagram

Click HERE for 50 of the most sensual sirens of the Belgian painter Paul Delvaux

Sources: instagram.com/sanayoshida/; yoshida-sana.jimdofree.com; shonandai-g.com; galleryzarof.official.ec