Ryogoku Hajimari

After spending long months in Japan, I found myself drawn to the silent gravity of the some place, the great arena where giants rise and fall.
It is more than a place, it is a temple built for collisions between worlds, where flesh becomes ritual and balance becomes faith.
When the arena is full yet no combat takes place, the air itself carries a tension, like a breath held between two eternities. The ground remembers every fall, every gesture, every grain of salt scattered to purify the ring.
It is a space of paradox, immense yet intimate, violent yet profoundly spiritual.
What fascinates me in the universe of these sacred giants is not their power, but their devotion to control. Their bodies are not weapons, but vessels of discipline, gravity, and silence. They embody a metaphysical balance between life and ritual, ego and emptiness, impact and stillness.
Through this first painting, I wanted to capture the invisible presence of the giants, to let the viewer feel what remains when the bodies disappear: the memory of movement, the echo of faith, the geometry of balance.
Like in all my work, I am less interested in the spectacle than in what lies beneath the surface of myth, where human fragility meets transcendence.
The ring is empty, yet it is full, filled with ghosts, prayers, and echoes of those who once carried the weight of gods.
Arilès De Tizi