Following the opening of his new exhibition, the artist who uses The New York Times as a canvas reflects on freedom of expression, fear and anxiety, and navigating life as an immigrant.
There couldn’t be a more fitting time for a Sho Shibuya exhibition on free speech. The Brooklyn-based artist’s ongoing exhibition Freedom of Speech is a compilation of twenty paintings made after the election and inauguration of President Donald Trump. Confronting media censorship and the retaliation against political expression, he responds with meditative paintings layered over the front page of The New York Times that invite viewers to reflect on the boundaries of free speech at a moment when expression in the United States feels increasingly fragile. Using The Times as a canvas also feels especially apt amid the President’s continuing legal battle with the paper.
The vulnerability of free speech isn’t just observed, but felt and shared by Shibuya, who sometimes finds himself wondering, “if I post something like this, will I be punished or face any consequences for expressing my true feelings?” As a Japanese national, Shibuya has also drawn attention to the fragility of immigrants’ freedom of speech — the risk of losing one’s visa for what is said. “I’ve been experiencing this kind of ups and downs, but I post anyway because I don’t want to write my feelings over,” said the artist. “Instead of hiding, I think about how I can conquer my anxiousness and fear.”
“They can say anything, but they can’t stop me from creating. I don’t know if this is the right way to digest frustrations, but at least I’m very honest with myself.”
When asked about the online backlash from those who disagree with his interpretations, Shibuya remains unfazed. For him, dissent is proof of the freedom he values most. “They can say anything, but they can’t stop me from creating,” the artist adds. “I don’t know if this is the right way to digest frustrations, but at least I’m very honest with myself.”
The key visual of the exhibition features a U.S. flag painted over a February front page, paying homage to the flag that was hung upside down at Yosemite National Park in protest against the mass layoffs of essential park employees in the current administration’s effort to cut federal spending.
Another work, headlined “Gazans Need to Eat,” presents a watermelon rind placed at the center of a painted-black Opinion page. “The eaten watermelon represents devastation,” Shibuya explains. “At the same time, students who peacefully protested in the U.S. were penalized, and the colors of green, red, white, and black were forbidden, which were also restrictions on freedom of speech.”
His practice also serves as a way to process and cope with the fatigue, grief, anger, and confusion that accompany today’s relentless flow of news. By translating those emotions into color and form, he slows time down, creating space to make sense of a world that often feels too fast, too loud, and too fractured to comprehend — a space perhaps we all need.
“Since I grew up in Japan, I never considered my privilege, I never felt worried about the next meal,” said Shibuya, who was born in a Tokyo suburb and moved to New York City in 2011. “I couldn’t stop imagining sharing the devastation. The headline took over my emotions, and I really wanted to do something.”
On the day of the exhibition’s opening, a Gaza ceasefire deal was reached. Shibuya responded by painting a sunrise shining over a pile of debris, created with gray acrylic paint and shredded newspaper bits that contained quotes of Gazans about the atrocities of war. “I was happy about [the ceasefire], but still the war continued.”
Such works speak to Shibuya’s deep conviction in the power of expression — a value that first drew him to the United States. Fifteen years ago, a 26-year-old Shibuya who barely spoke any English had saved enough from his work as a graphic designer to take a trip to New York City. Right after he dropped off his luggage in the Bronx, he made his way to the top of the Empire State Building, where he looked down to see the Pride parade marching through the streets of Manhattan.
“I could be wrong, but 15 years ago, LGBTQ activism did not garner as much attention in Japan,” the artist reminisced. “I saw so many energetic people strolling on Broadway very proudly. I’ve never felt that kind of energy before, and I thought it was a good sign to move here.”
Though the idea of the American Dream has long been disillusioned, it’s fair to say that Shibuya has, in many ways, lived one. Three months after he first visited New York City, he moved there with a B4-sized portfolio, with hopes to intern while he learns English. “Interning meant not getting paid, but I wanted to learn to be a great designer,” said Shibuya. He was subsequently hired by a fellow graphic designer who had just started his own business. “I don’t know why, but he also provided a private English tutor — work started at 9 a.m. and I went at 8 a.m. to take English lessons.”
After securing a proper visa, Shibuya hopped between many companies — without an academic background in design, he prefers “learning by doing.” At a start-up that sells suitcases, Shibuya was inspired by the calligrapher who hand-painted customers’ initials onto the products. “I looked at it and thought, oh, maybe I can do it too,” the artist said. “I went to Blick, an art supplies store in the city, and got the same exact materials. I started spending two to three hours every day for four years on calligraphy of Japanese Katakana letters and posting the results.”
Shibuya’s newfound routine stands in stark contrast to his earlier years working in Japan. Not only are the geometric, minimal Katakana calligraphy a sharp contrast to the dense, overflowing Japanese magazine spreads he used to design, but the work-life balance in the U.S. also gave him the space to explore his own creativity. “In Japan, I was an editorial designer with four magazine deadlines every week, so all designers just slept on the office floor at night.” In both ways, he gained more space to breathe.
This sense of ritual continued into the pandemic, when he began climbing to his rooftop each morning to watch the sunrise and paint its shifting colors onto that day’s front page — a daily practice he has kept up with for the past five years. In June 2020, he woke up to the news of George Floyd’s murder and the flood of all-black posts expressing solidarity on social media. Responding instinctively, he painted the entire front page black, marking the beginning of what he would later call his “event paintings.”
Above left: ‘Epstein Files,’ by Sho Shibuya. Above right: ‘Harvard,’ by Sho Shibuya. Courtesy of Bienvenu Steinberg & C and Sho Shibuya.
All of Shibuya’s work has come about naturally. He never set out to start a series, only to maintain the routines he created for himself. The routines are guided by the spontaneity that arises from responding intuitively to life’s changes, which he renders visually. “To be honest, I still don’t know if the sunrise paintings are different from the event paintings,” he says. “They may be the same; they may not. But they’re certainly an integral part of my daily life — they use the same medium, and they coexist in my mind.”
Almost every day, Shibuya wakes up at 5 a.m. Besides painting, he reads, runs, takes a cold shower, and makes breakfast. He likes to think that “consistency makes him open to anything beyond it,” a mindset reminiscent of time-based art like On Kawara’s date paintings or Tehching Hsieh’s year-long performance works. As with his commitment to free expression — and to painting as a way to cope with overwhelming headlines — he embraces whatever feels human. He sometimes forgets the themes of past works and isn’t concerned with the future of the series.
“It’s never really just about painting on newspapers,” Shibuya said. “It’s an instinctive process — something very natural and true to myself. Even if The Times stops printing one day, until then I’ll keep painting; I’ll paint the sunrise every single day, and figure the rest out later.”
As of recently, Shibuya’s sunrise paintings have gotten a little bluer than before because he recently became a father and needs some more well-deserved rest. “Before I could capture the really bright orange at the bottom and the purple sky to the top, but now things are changing,” he said. “At the beginning, I didn’t know if that was okay or not. But I think it’s all natural because we are human.”
Homepage banner image: ‘Distressed Flag.’ Inside top image: Gallery, atmosphere image. Courtesy of Bienvenu Steinberg & C, Photograph by Guillaume Zicarelli. The exhibition Freedom of Speech runs from October 9 to November 8, 2025, at Bienvenu Steinberg & C.
