Martin Lawrence Galleries will be filling the Summer with the singularly spectacular work of Takashi Murakami throughout the month of June.
MLG’s Summer Fling will be showing Murakami’s colorful paintings which reveal the consistent, universal themes that have guided the artist’s work. Each work of art reflects his craft and insightful engagement with popular culture, folklore and pop art style, all mixed with traditional Japanese culture. One of today’s most imaginative artists, Murakami is universally recognized for both his fine art and commercial output — including collaborations with hip-hop stars Kanye West and Pharrell Williams, as well as designs for the fashion and beauty industry with Louis Vuitton, Issey Miyake, and Shu Uemura.
Murakami was influenced by animated films (anime), comic books (manga), and global branding, and creates and adapts his recognizable characters into a style that he has dubbed “Superflat”-a tribute to the two-dimension style of classic Japanese cartoons. The theory posits that there is a legacy of flat, 2-dimensional imagery from Japanese Art history in manga and anime.
Born and raised in Tokyo, Japan, Takashi Murakami attended the Tokyo University of Arts where he acquired the drafting skills necessary to become an animator but eventually majored in Nihonga, the ‘traditional style of Japanese painting that incorporates traditional artistic conventions, techniques, and subjects. In 1994, Murakami received a fellowship from the Asian Cultural Council and spent a year in the PS1 International Studio Program in New York City. During his stay, he was exposed to and highly inspired by Western contemporary artists and the art movement of Simulationism, which engages in a play of relationships between cells, icons and the increasing geometricization of the social space in the world in which we live.
"I am not a political artist, my target is children, I found my market, my sweet spot, Okay, this is my zone — for the kids”-Takashi Murakami
Takashi Murakami, Kaikai and Kiki: “Lots of Fun”, offset print with cold stamp and high gloss varnishing, 26.75 x 26.75 inches
Murakami works have been exhibited in over 82 museums around the globe including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan Society, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, New York, Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow. Most recently his first retrospective was installed at the Vancouver Art Gallery in Canada. This summer the Fort Worth Museum of Art will host the highly anticipated retrospective Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg, showcasing more than three decades of his spectacular works.
Takashi Murakami is one of the family of superb 20th and 21st century artists, such as Warhol, Haring, Chagall, Picasso and Miró that MLG proudly offers at their fine art galleries located in nine cities including New York, New Orleans, Maui, La Jolla, Costa Mesa, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco and Las Vegas.
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