Because of the pianist, Glenn Gould, Takeshi began to listen to classical music such as Bach, Beethoven and etc… He taught himself how to play the piano, and found a pleasurable sensation in the expression =” Touching piano key create the sounds”. The expression is simple but pure and direct. From this experience, he tried to synthesize this way of expression with his art. He looked for more tactile and vivid expressions, in order to get a pure and pleasurable feeling. In this period, he studied Sotatsu Twaraya ( Japanese artist famous for Fujin and Raijin ) and Shan shui ( Chinese painting that involves scenery or natural landscapes, using a brush and ink ) This led him to draw “Thunder GOD”. He went to NY and visited the MOMA and Metropolitan Museum.

During this period, Giacometti's paintings, Michelangelo's later sculptures and monochrome ink paintings of Murakami-Kagaku influenced his work. He digested each painter and expanded his world-view of art. And thus, three paintings were born: "icon" "other side 01" and "kakizome". He wanted to express something dim and obscure, but vivid and impressive. Many layers of paint make vague figure but they also give viewers a strong impact.

Takeshi dredged up deep-seated graphic memories he had tucked in his mythical world. He tried to imagine the emotions and memories of the departed saint, and relived the experience of her last moment. This fueled his motivation to draw the following paintings. "The last vision", he drew the moment when she hanged herself. He likely put himself in her place, and wondered what her last sight had been, and what she had been thinking. "The head is dead" depicts a soulless head empty like a box. "The other side" shows the transience of humans, by drawing the burning dead body in an incinerator. From this period, he switched from oil paintings to watercolor and ink painting.

Takeshi had many traumatic dreams which he could never forget. “At that time, I often suffered from nightmares. I dreamed about dead Kumiko. Her family and I were able to revive Kumiko, but she forgot she had died. We tried to spend the time normally with her lest she would know she was dead. However, her body was rotting so she found out anyways. She then went on a crazy rampage. I realized I had done something really terrible, and confessed my error in that horrific scene.” To forget his horrors, he hid his emotion in his pictures: “dune”　“implant death mask” and “Ending dusky”. In these paintings, he expressed the land of the dead. He prayed for the departed soul and also to take his fear away. He told himself that the dead soul is not an individual soul, but a universal mass. At the time, he moved to Tokyo from Osaka. He had an opportunity to coordinate a wedding reception and a dance performance for his friends, professional performer WATARU and HITOMI YAMATANI. As he was in charge of large art work, he laid canvas on the floor, and painted in a posture of kneeling downwards with the head bowed toward the canvas. This way of painting was a soul-awakening discovery. Since then, he has stopped using the easel.

After Kumiko’s death, Takeshi avoided painting for a while. However, her dead face came back to haunt him, and he decided to take a brush, and paint Kumiko’s loneliness and agony. But, the creature he made was empty and pathetic as if the manlike monster was created by Dr.Frankenstein. He was trying to make something nice but he ended up making nothing but so sad. Personal matter changed to the pursuit of universal death and insanity. He painted “Rhinal memory”, “Existence” and “Face”. He didn’t draw the background but drew only the protruded face without an outline. It shows a strong presence in the paintings. The faces lack individuality, but show the general emotions that all human beings have. For these paintings, He used “Mona Lisa”, painted by Leonardo da Vinci and “Noh masks” used in Noh as his ideas. (Noh is traditional Japanese musical drama which began to flourish in the fourteenth century.) Around this period, he visited the Louvre, Orsay and the Pompidou center in Paris. He also visited Cézanne’s atelier in Aix-en- Provence, and Picasso’s museum in Spain. He organized an exhibition named “existence and memory” with photographer, Motoko Kamata, in Shibuya, Tokyo

He had many mysterious experiences at this time. In 2000 August, Kumiko committed suicide. She burnt incense then she hang herself. She left a picture of a person who was reincarnated as a white moth. She was 25years old. He observed her post- rigor face and half- opened mouth all night long. He branded the scene in his mind. He also spent the night finishing her last portrait. He displayed it at the altar of the funeral. It was a sad portrait which showed agony and loneliness. A middle aged lady who attended the funeral started crying seeing the portrait. She was moved, and she held Takeshi’s hand. At that moment, he realized the meaning of painting. He knew, for the first time, painting had power in conveying messages from artist to audiences. The portrait was sealed with Kumiko in the coffin, and burnt. On his way home from the crematorium, a white moth landed on his finger for a long time. After the funeral, he drew three pictures to calm down his sorrow and insanity. But he was too scared to look at them. He sealed these pictures.

As he was inspired by master artists like Picasso, Francis Beacon, Shiko Munakata, and Taro Okamoto, he explored various ways of expression using oil painting, acrylic painting and wood-block print. He was influenced by André Malraux’s idea of “Sacre=Sacred” and he created several works on the subject of death and mythical things. “Justice” is one of the works. He was inspired by Malraux’s word “la brisure= rupture” and interpreted the profile line of paintings, as the boundary which mark off dimensionality. He wanted to express ambiguity of existence, by deforming the profile line. “Torii Gate” is an example. One day he had the same dream Kumiko had. They saw a statue of goodness that was enshrined. They made a trip to seek this dream. Of course they didn’t have any clue to find her, but followed their instinct. When they reached a shrine near the sea, they found the goodness. This curious experience led him to draw “Megami”.

Takeshi was born in Amagasaki city, Hyogo prefecture, in 1974. He grew up in Osaka. When he was 14years old, his father bought him the complete works of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He was shocked and strongly inspired by the western art, and professed his desire to become an artist. He studied the basis of drawing in a prep school for Art College for a year, and then entered Nara College of fine art, where he met Kumiko. Although he studied design art for a year and half, he refused to have a conventional art education. He decided to leave college, and acquired oil painting skills on his own.