Contemporary abstract artist Gina Keatley has announced the debut of Motto Motto, a five-painting acrylic-on-canvas series developed between New York City and Akō, Japan. The announcement coincides with Keatley completing the ownership transition of Bushwick Gallery in Brooklyn and expanding Salt Road Studio, an artist-led platform in Akō focused on contemporary art, publishing, international exchange, and future residency programming.
The series takes its name from the Japanese word motto, meaning “more.” Repeated as motto motto, the phrase becomes both an instruction and a rhythm: a commitment to continue beyond the moment when a painting first appears resolved. The five works—More Depth, More Motion, More Expanse, More Resonance, and More Cadence—each measure 48 by 36 inches. Across blush, cream, sand, smoke, and pale earth tones, Keatley layers acrylic, scrapes, veils, interrupts, and rebuilds the surface. Faint flashes of mandarin orange, introduced through her raindrop technique, bring energy to the quieter palette while darker marks and fragments remain visible beneath.
“Motto Motto is about pushing past the first point where a painting feels finished,” Keatley says. “It is about taking more from the process. More time, more movement, more pressure, more room to see what the work can become.”
Rather than illustrating Japan, the series treats movement between New York and Akō as a working condition. Distance, atmosphere, and cultural experience enter the paintings through process instead of literal imagery. Accumulation, revision, and return become the shared structure connecting the five canvases. This approach underscores Keatley’s ongoing exploration of place, movement, and material tension, which she describes as power through fragility.
That geographic shift is also institutional. After founding and directing Bushwick Gallery, Keatley is completing the gallery’s ownership transition while turning greater attention toward Salt Road Studio. The Akō-based initiative connects her New York practice with the Seto Inland Sea region and is being developed to support contemporary art, artist-led publishing, international exchange, and future residency programming. This move signals a strategic expansion of her artistic footprint, bridging her established presence in New York with emerging opportunities in Japan.
The result is a body of work that feels weathered and newly made at once: soft in palette, yet insistent in presence. Each painting carries its own cadence while remaining part of a shared visual language built through touch, interruption, and persistence. Motto Motto marks a continued refinement of Keatley’s abstract practice and a transition toward a broader international framework for her work.
The series and press images can be viewed at https://untamedmoderns.com/gina-keatley-motto-motto-series/. Untamed Moderns, an independent contemporary art platform presenting Keatley’s work, publishes new bodies of work and artist-led initiatives, including Salt Road Studio. More information is available at https://untamedmoderns.com.
