About

 

About

Lena Yokoyama is a Japanese/Austrian illustrator and printmaker based in London. She is represented by Grand Matter.

Lena’s work highlights diversity in a playful and colourful way, inspired by her own experience of growing up in a multicultural environment. Her artworks, created through a mix of painting, printmaking, and digital techniques, feature a variety of characters and curious personalities that emerge from a process of combining incidental shapes with considered lines, colour and texture. 

Recent Clients

The New York Times, Hermès, Google, Airbnb, Ferment Magazine, It’s Nice That, Red Bull, The TATE, The Guardian, Camden Hells Brewery, Mondo Brewery, Paperboy London, Community Bridges, South London Gallery, the Austrian Embassy, The Bower Publication House, MAP London, Soho House, So Young Magazine, Selfridges, The Quentin Blake Center for Illustration, Tonkotsu

Simultaneous Practices

  • Lena is a VP (Visiting Practitioner) at Camberwell College of Arts, London

  • Lena is part of an illustration collective called ISSHOO Collective. Together, they run mural workshops, plan exhibitions and paint murals.

Selected Press

Live talks and Podcasts

  • Illustrators Acquainted, January 2024

  • VP talk at Camberwell College of Arts on ‘Editorial Illustration’ 2023

  • INELOSO Podcast, October 2023

  • FH Würzburg, Germany 2021

Awards

  • World Illustration Awards, Shortlist, 2024

  • World Illustration Awards, Longlist, 2021

  • UAL Graduate Incubation Programme selection, 2020

  • Macmillan Price for Illustration, Highly Commended, 2019

  • TATE Christmas Cards Competition, Winner, 2019

  • Xhibit Selected Exhibitioner, 2017

  • Red Bull Art Scholarship, 2016

Residencies

  • El Sur Art Residency, Mexico City, February 2024

  • Drawing Residency, Marseille, France, July - September 2023

  • MORNING People Fund Residency, Tokyo, September 2022

  • Google Artist in Residence, March-May 2022

  • ArteSumapaz Art Residency, Colombia, July - September 2021

  • OUTPOST Printmaking Residency, London,  July 2020

Exhibitions

  • Espacios Imedios, Mexico City, March 2024

  • Postcards from Marseille to Elsewhere, Peckham Pelican, London, September 2023

  • Onomatopoeia, Tokyo Bike, London, April-May 2023

  • Mujer Con Fruta, Peckham Pelican, London, May 2022

  • Mujer Con Fruta, Colombia, 2021

  • University of the Arts Degree Show, Virtual, 2020

  • Interim Show, London, 2020

  • A Study in Cyan, Finsbury Park, London, 2019

  • Windows, GX Gallery, London, 2018

  • A mythic understanding, Camberwell Space Gallery, London, 2018

  • Print Show at Lumberjack, London, 2018

  • Spitalfields Market Pitch, Shoreditch, London, 2018

  • CCW Foundation Graduate Show, London, 2017

  • Xhibit, London, 2017

  • Red Bull Fashion Show, Hangar7, Austria, 2015


Contact:

yokoyama.lena@gmail.com

For new commissions, please get in touch with my agents George and Chloë at: hello@grandmatter.com