updated: Jun 21,2010

Born on July 24, 1976 in Fukuma, Fukuoka. Flower shop owner.He came to Tokyo in 1997 to make his debut in a rock band with four members. While engaged in the band activities, he started to work as a trader in Ota Market, one of the biggest markets of flowers and ornamental plants in Japan.

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: May 28,2009

On March 9, 2009, I visited AMKK (Makoto Azuma, Kaki Kenkyujo) and JARDINS des FLEURS, which had moved to Minami-Aoyama on January 11, 2009. My aim was to interview Makoto Azuma, who had held exhibitions at AMPG twenty-four times and had just finished his photographic exhibition entitled "AMPG vol.24+1".

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Mar 26,2009

18/MAR/2009-24/MAY/2009, Mitsubishi-Jisho ARTIUM
This is a comprehensive exhibition of Azuma’s private gallery activities of twenty-four exhibitions up to the present exhibition of artworks using plants. The gallery was operated by Azuma himself for two years from April 2007 to March 2009 in Kiyosumi-Shirakawa.

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Apr 21,2009

03/APR/2009-09/APR/2009, ELMO LEWIS Gallery
"TOTAL" is a kind of project exhibition, which is also organized as a presentation party of Elmo Lewis Inc, a company which has started to import and sell planters made by VesseL USA Inc. Works created by Makoto Azuma using planters and paintings by Kensuke Sasaki are displayed together in this exhibition space

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Jun 29,2009

18/MAR/2009-24/MAY/2009, Mitsubishi-Jisho ARTIUM
Makoto Azuma dislikes nostalgia intensely. When AMPG, which he had been operating for two years, closed in March 2009, he said, "…this means neither a starting point nor an ending of something", which means that Azuma is looking towards the "present" or the "future" in creating his works.

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Jul 20,2009

15/MAY/2009-07/JUN/2009, EYE OF GYRE
Distortion X Flowers is the long-awaited exhibition for those of us who are familiar with the background of Azuma, now a florist, as an aspiring youth who left his hometown Fukuoka to come to Tokyo to start his musical career.

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Sep 16,2009

26/JUL/2009-, Naoshima Bath “I♥湯”
What a greedy man I am to seek added value for Japanese-style public baths and hot springs, though it is pleasant enough just to sit in a large bathtub with my legs stretched out. I never go to bath houses since I have a bath at home....

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Oct 19,2009

18/SEP/2009-27/SEP/2009, 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT
This show was held in Tokyo as part of the exhibition tour of the "TOKYO FIBER ’09", which was held first at Triennale Design Museum, Milano around the same term as La Triennale Di Milano in April, 2009, under the direction of the designer, Kenya Hara.

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Oct 29,2009

10/OCT/2009-11/OCT/2009, adidas Plants House
The plastic greenhouse about which I would like to write here is located in a corner of Sakuragaoka, Setagaya Ward. We often see that vegetables and fruits are cultivated for foods in greenhouses which are owned by farmers. Nevertheless, this greenhouse is different to that of general in that there are some kinds of trees...

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Nov 23,2009

30/OCT/2009-03/NOV/2009, CLEAR GALLERY
There is one anecdote. Hideyoshi Toyotomi heard that morning glories were blooming beautifully in Sen no Rikyu’s garden and he wished to visit there. However, as soon as reaching Rikyu’s garden...

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Jan 11,2010

01/DEC/2009-05/MAY/2010, ARK HILLS ARK KARAJAN PLACE
Indeed, the title of the works, "Bridge of Plants" (2009), created by Makoto Azuma, and their concept of "working as bridges between cities and nature" would make you imagine in a relatively-easy way the figure of bridges created by using plants...

author: Satoshi KOGANEZAWA 

published: Sep 23,2008

"AMPG"(AZUMA MAKOTO PRIVATE GALLERY), the private gallery where Azuma Makoto established for presenting his artwork using flower/plant monthly for two years from April, 2007 to March, 2009.

updated: Jul 3,2010

In a white space, (s)he stood still in the distance to stare at Makoto Azuma. “LEAF MAN” is the existence Azuma saw in his dreams sometimes. Rezfan(F), Monsutera (M), Haran (F), Kuwazuimo (M), Yashi (F), Asuparagasu - Pera (M), Sanderina (F), Erendarika (M), Tamashida (F), Sumairakkusu (M).

updated: Jul 3,2010

Do you know Yukio Nakagawa (born in 1918)? He learned Ikenobo-style Ikebana from his grandmother, and in 1950, joined Hakkuto-sha, the Ikebana research group presided over by Mirei Shigemori, landscape researcher and gardener. In 1951, he became disaffiliated from Ikenobo.

updated: Jul 3,2010

When entering the gallery, it smelled slightly, but not because of rotten flowers/plants. As I walked in, I saw that something black was scattered on the floor. The smell was caused by firecrackers and the scattered material was pieces of dahlias that had been blown up by them.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A slender green bud of an Easter lily is articulated on the tip of a silver hand clip stuck in the concrete. The theme of this second artwork, which was created after "Botanical Sculpture #1 Assemblage" (February 2008), is "holding (catching)".

updated: Jul 11,2010

Those who are accustomed to Azuma's work must never have expected that he would use vacuum packing for the "SHIKI" series, which has used iron framing, a freezer and an aquarium in the past.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A vertically long acrylic case. A piece of beef was hanging down from the upper side. Vivid red paphiopedilum was pinned onto the beef that was hanging in the air and gradually changing its color to dark red.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Following "Shiki" (2005) to use iron framing as a form, the second "SHIKI" used ice as a form. He displayed the pine in a freezer manufactured in cooperation with Imaseki Ice Technical Laboratory.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Photos of flowers/plants placed in cups are displayed on the walls. They are on a cup or just put beside a cup. The flowers/plants are waste materials, not for sale as products. The beauty and the interest of their figure are remarkable.

updated: Jul 3,2010

The room light is turned off and scattered incandescent lamps illuminate a huge cage. It looks like one used to hold savage animals, but the lock is an unreliable padlock.

updated: Jul 3,2010

As the reply to "Bamboo" (published in "Howling at the Moon" in 1917) by Sakutaro Hagiwara, he created a bamboo grove consisting of one bamboo and twenty-five photo panels.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Green peeping through a brown lump almost vertically rises up against the concrete side, for a short distance. That thick bud and stem look like a male sexual organ, however, the pointed end will break into red colors and finally produce a big, beautiful flower.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Several flowers/plants are combined by using bands within a four meter stage. The first theme of "Botanical Sculpture" series is "Assemblage". It has massiveness, but the rhythmical arrangement is also fun.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A flower is a sexual organ. Pollens produced by stamens are pollinated on an ovule that is part of a pistil, and seeds are born.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A red exhibition room created by red film pasted onto the windows and fluorescent lighting.

updated: Jul 3,2010

In the middle of November, Christmas trees can be seen here and there. The colorfully decorated, glittery trees are welcomed by people. It is the busiest season for Azuma, a flower shop owner, and he often used to accept the job of providing trees.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A Japanese white pine tree is floating in a one-meter cubic acrylic case filled with water. The case directly placed on the floor lowers our eyes to force us to look at the pine tree from above.

updated: Jul 3,2010

In sharp contrast to the entirely red space of the last exhibition, a cool place was produced in the middle of a hot summer. The keyword for this exhibition is "appreciation".

updated: Jul 3,2010

Japanese cedar reaching a height of 2m and a weight of 200kg, Leucobryum juniperoideum. The planters used to carry each plant move around the exhibition room at a speed of 2km per hour, sometimes rotating or turning around by crashing into each other.

updated: Jul 3,2010

I want to end by just describing the beauty of this. Frankly, I would like to keep silent without speaking any words.

updated: Jul 3,2010

What an extravagant title! The diagram written on the wall, "punk = tank = fuck = Punk tank garden" against "infinity = space = empty = Japanese garden", is also brilliant.

updated: Jul 3,2010

A red line is drawn on the floor near the entrance of the exhibition room. As one walks into the room, a huge refrigerator is found in which a vast number of gladioli are arranged.

updated: Jul 3,2010

The hands of a mannequin are placed on a rectangular concrete slab. Each hand, wearing a white glove, holds a cylinder in which flowers are arranged in small amount of water.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Over twenty branches of Japanese plums are set out in a decorative pattern in a basin in the gallery. Banding bands used for "Botanical Sculpture #1 Assemblage" (February 2008) are also used here, but basically the branches support each other.

updated: Jul 3,2010

It was not only me who felt amazed on entering the gallery. Azuma did not try too hard because of the last AMPG exhibition, nor did he fall into sentimentality and simply enjoy looking back over the past two years.

updated: Jul 3,2010

This is a photographic work announced in his solo exhibition "Distortion×Flowers". Various vivid flowers and plants make up the whole like a collage centering on one effector.

updated: Jul 3,2010

Two years after the exhibition in AMPG, this was a work announced in the fourth stage of "AMPG vol. 25, The 4th Stage" held in Mitsubishi-Jisho ARTIUM in Fukuoka, the artist’s hometown.

updated: Jul 3,2010

This is the first work for Azuma of a single flower in a Hasami-yaki vase. It has a long process to have arrived to this pottery form through the conceptual stage in 2005 and the announcement at AMPG in 2009.

updated: Jul 28,2010

announced the works at iida's new model symposium

updated: Mar 8,2011

Azuma embodies the sense of beauty and the outlook on the world produced by the musicians.

updated: Jul 4,2011

for the charity art project organized by Herman Miller and more Trees design.