Minol Araki

PHOENIX - In his own way the Japanese artist Minol Araki had developed a cross-cultural mind-set by an early age. Born in 1928 in Dairen, now Luda, China, a port city in Japanese-occupied Manchuria, he grew up in a place of Japanese, Chinese and Russian influences. He began painting when he was 6 and as an adult became one of the postwar era's most successful industrial designers. About 20 million units of one of his lamps were sold worldwide, but still he considered himself a painter first. But until recently, Mr. Araki had never exhibited his work or sold it through galleries. This unassuming purveyor of a unique variety of Chinese-derived ink-brush painting is now the subject of ''Minol Araki: Art of Two Worlds,'' a retrospective exhibition that remains at the Phoenix Art Museum through July 18. ''I've always lived and worked in the gap,'' the 71-year-old artist said, describing a self-awareness that he says has informed every aspect of his personal life and professional career as he has shuttled among homes in Tokyo, Taipei and New York. He was here because of his show. ''There's the gap between my past in China and my past in Japan,'' Mr. Araki explained. ''Between my experiences as a businessman in the East and in the West. And the gap I've felt between design and fine art.''