Pierre Soulages

The inaugural exhibition at the new Perrotin Tokyo gallery, the latest outpost in Emmanuel Perrotin's gallery empire that now stretches across eight spaces in five cities, pays homage to French artist Pierre Soulages, who turns a whopping 98 years old this year. His Japan connection runs quite deep, having first exhibited on these shores way back in 1951. Soulages – also a recipient of the Praemium Imperiale painting prize, awarded by the imperial family – is best known for works that play on the twin extremes of light and darkness, painted with extreme precision and with cleanly delineated, zigzagging strokes. This show, however, focuses on the resin-based approach that this pioneering conceptualist has focused on in his more recent work.