Leiko Ikemura (born 22 August 1951 in Tsu, Mie Prefecture, Japan) is a Japanese-Swiss artist.
In the 1960s, when the Second Feminist Movement emerged, 17-year-old Leiko Ikemura, keenly aware that her and her mother could never achieve equal status in society and in their family, resolved to leave her homeland. In 1972, she moved to Spain, then to Switzerland, and finally, in 1983, to Germany. Influenced by German Neo-Expressionism, Ikemura developed her distinctive graphic language, creating a world of loneliness and longing, alongside the pursuit of coexistence behind the illusion of fantasy. Her works draw on both the ethereal lightness of native Japanese art, such as the ink paintings of Sesshū Tōyō, and the geometric abstraction of Western Post-Impressionism. In contrast to the harshness of Western modernism, Ikemura’s art remains rather introverted, with traditional oriental culture looming over her works.