Yuri Shimojo is a Tokyo-born contemporary Japanese painter who lives and works between New York and Kyoto.

The last descendant of her samurai lineage, who lost all of her immediate family members before the age of 30, Shimojo has always used painting to express the interconnected emotions of impermanence. Using traditional Japanese watercolor or ground SUMI and SHU ink, her work blends the abstract and the surreal, often playful and always evoking a desire for universal compassion.

With minimal formal training in fine art, her style is grounded in traditional Japanese performing arts. She spent many years in Hawaii practicing ancient spirituality while studying animal communication and healing art. These borderless experiences have shaped her work throughout her life and continue to bring new sources of inspiration.

Her publication history includes a memoir of her unique childhood with her late family. She has exhibited in the United States and Japan; her work is in private and public collections around the world, including the Boston Public Library, Cleveland Clinic, Fidelity, Hood Museum, and others.

Her upcoming solo show, “SUMI and SHU in Praise of Shadows,” opens Feb 17th 2027, at Praise Shadows Gallery in Boston.