Honoring the spirit relations among living creatures, artist Janice Hidemi’s whimsical and culturally rich work often expressed her vision of people through animals and her vision of animals through people. Known for her charming and playful portraits of women and pugs, her art is deeply rooted in Japanese traditions, and fantasy.

 

Janice Hidemi was born in Tokyo in 1954, the youngest of six and began painting when she was only three years old. Recognizing their daughter’s talent, her parents arranged for her to study with the renowned artist Yasuko Okamoto where she learned basic drawing skills. Hidemi earned a B.F.A. in Painting at Women’s College of Fine Art, Tokyo and studied lithography under the supervision of Fumio Tamura, showing her prints at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum. She came to the United States for advance study,  receiving a M. S. in Electrical Engineering from San Jose State University,  a M.F.A. in Printmaking and a Post-Baccalaureate in Painting from the San Francisco Art Institute, where she studied under Frances McCormack. Her work, with its Asian composition style and dreamy colorful imagery became popular quickly and has been exhibited in solo and group shows, published in newspapers and art magazines and collected nationally and internationally. 

 

Sadly, Janice Hidemi was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2021 and passed away in 2023. Appreciating that art was central to her life, her husband, Alan Wong, has collaborated with Whitney Modern to host a retrospective of her work.