JDJ is thrilled to present a solo presentation by Minako Iwamura (b. 1967, Sydney, Australia, lives and works in New York City) at The Armory Show 2026, Booth P21.

For the fair, Iwamura has created a new suite of paintings accompanied by a site-specific drawing that extends the visual language of the works onto the booth wall.

Iwamura’s paintings are constructed using a precise vocabulary of symmetry, geometry, and color, yet their impact is anything but rigid. Vertically oriented forms swell, taper, overlap, and interlock, creating compositions that hover between the architectural and the bodily. Smaller paintings evoke intimacy and concentration, while larger works provide more room for these forms to unfold.

At the center of the presentation is Sea, a large triptych that brings together many of the forms that recur throughout Iwamura’s work. Flanking it on one side are medium-sized paintings, including Moth and Sprout 2, while the opposite wall features clusters of smaller paintings accompanied by a site-specific wall drawing in white charcoal on a dark blue background. Together, these works showcase the breadth of Iwamura’s practice, from intimate paintings to larger compositions that engage with the surrounding space. 

Color is central to Iwamura’s exploration of perception. Gradients shift from deep blues, charcoal, and cool grays into luminous pinks, ochres, oranges, and yellows, creating the sensation of light moving through translucent surfaces. In the darker works, layered hues create depth and quiet tension. Iwamura’s controlled application of oil produces a velvety matte surface, while fine white charcoal lines trace geometric relationships beneath the softness of the color.

Underlying this formal rigor is Iwamura’s interest in geometry as both structural element and symbolic representation. Patterns drawn from nature and fractal forms provide a framework for considering states of consciousness and the interplay between order and intuition. Her paintings can be interpreted as abstract portraits of energies, psychological states, and forms of inner experience.

Drawing on archetypal imagery and the idea of the collective unconscious, Iwamura creates works that resist a single interpretation. Instead, they invite the viewer to slow down and attend to subtle shifts in color, balance, scale, and perception.

The presentation offers a concentrated view of Iwamura’s evolving practice: paintings that function as images, structures, and vessels—holding light, presence, and the possibility of interior reflection.