Runa Ikeda / Artist Runa Ikeda was born in Japan, Saitama Prefecture on a heavy, snowy day in spring. She grew up in an environment that fully surrounded by her father’s paintings, which later influenced her and became a great inspiration on her style. Her mother is from Okinawa, the southernmost prefecture of Japan. Okinawan culture has its unique style of a mixture of American and Japanese influences. Although Runa herself wasn’t born in Okinawa, you can find the colors that reflects Okinawa’s marvelous world in most of her work. ​At the age of 18, Runa began to express various thoughts about living in a complicated environment in combination with her experiences during her adolescence that transpires on her work. Although at the beginning her paintings didn’t express a lot of happiness; the canvas was the space to project all internal self freely. By then, Runa soon determined that she was going to make art her life. After graduating from high school, she enrolled in Tokyo Design Academy, a well-known art school that has been producing a great number of true artists and creators in Japan. In this field, Runa met Terukei Matsunami, an artist whom Runa has admired highly ever since, and who had helped raise Runa's work to a new level of expressionism and unbounded imagination in her art. ​While attending Tokyo Design Academy, Runa gradually began to exhibit her work at public exhibitions. To date she has earned the Design Department Award at the Nika Art Exhibition 2008, the Special Award at the Germany Berlin Art Festival 2012 and the Creative Award at the Creative Expression's Exhibition 2013 held by the Scott Hall Gallery. At the same time, Runa also worked on preforming live painting in live music clubs, continuing to exhibit her works in public, producing CD jackets & business cards, as well as designing book covers. In particular, during live painting events, Runa is able to intuitively channel her sensory perception of the venue’s atmosphere and reflect it in her work. This is the main appeal of her painting style. There are as many interpretations of her painting as there are viewers. She also held twice a solo exhibition at the Tokyo Waseda Dorado Gallery, where her paintings were almost sold out. ​Later, Runa formed a photographer-painter duo called "solaris∞film" with photographer Akiko Mori. The team undertook various painting and photography collaborations as well as selling designed T-shirts. In addition, they also collaborated with contemporary dancers and models on multiple projects. These collaborations have greatly expanded her artistic range. Production plans and activities were transferred to Toronto offices currently.