At 46, Shoichiro Satake, owner of Galerie Sho Contemporary Art, is Japan's biggest dealer of works by Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat. While more than 3,000 Warhols and 100 Basquiats have passed through his hands, their essence has stayed with him.
It is hard to share pain, but through art we can. The more people see a piece and absorb its suffering, the more its negative energy is transformed into positive. Art is magic.
I communicate with people through art, which is pretty close to religion. The artist is God and I'm the priest selling God's soul. It's too bad that many Japanese don't believe in God.