Takashi Murakami

Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo
Galleria Pinksummer and Newsantandrea, Genoa
Acquired directly from the above by the present owner in February 2000

Exhibition Catalogue, Tokyo, Parco Gallery, DOB in the Strange Forest, 2000, pp. 15, 16 and m. 008
Kay Itoi, "The wizard of DOB" in Artnews, March 2001, pp. 21 and 136, illustrated in colour

"Maintaining the balance and interplay of cutesy and monstrous, the morphing DOB finds its counterpart in the exquisite paintings of schematic flowers. The petals of each surround beaming smiley faces. Unsurprisingly the demented, frozen smile is more unsettling than the more personality rich maws of the DOBzillae." (David Rimanelli, "Takashi Murakami" in Art Forum, November 1999, p. 135)

In the same way that Andy Warhol chose to repeat the same single motif through numerous editions until he had exhausted and explored every combination, Murakami has also chosen a select few painted motifs to reflect the global society we live in. The flower originally appeared in Murakami’s work as a sidekick to DOB, where its immediate popularity led to the initiation of the Cosmos series in 1998. This series, to which the present work Pink Summer belongs, was entirely devoted to variations on this most Japanese of motifs, and alludes to ancient Japanese screen prints with their delicate, decorative imagery, while simultaneously recalling 1960s retro flower-power designs. By juxtaposing these very different sources, "the artist attempts to bring the revered tradition of screen printing up to the present day, offering a new standard of beauty more inflicted by digital illustrator programs than ink and brush." (Michael Darling in The Meaning of the Nonsense of the Meaning, New York 2000, p. 70) Pink Summer, like all of the artist’s works, displays an impeccable and exemplary degree of craftsmanship that encourages the viewer to contemplate where Murakami’s art has come from, and in which direction it is heading.

Having graduated from art school, Murakami spent nine years working at a prep school teaching young children how to draw flowers every day. Initially he disliked the flowers "but as I continued teaching in the school, my feelings changed: their smell, their shape – it all made me feel almost physically sick, and at the same time I found them very ‘cute’. Each one seemed to have its own feelings, its own personality …There is this image of strength in them; it is the same image of strength I find when drawing a human face. So I thought that … I would very much like to make a work in which I would represent them as if in a crowd scene … I really wanted to convey this impression of unease, of the threatening aspect of an approaching crowd." (Takashi Murakami in Exhibition Catalogue, Paris, Fondation Cartier pour l’Art Contemporain; London, Serpentine Gallery, Takashi Murakami, 2002-2003, p. 84)

The flatness of the flower paintings, their simple composition, and their abundance and brightness of colour, adds to their universal appeal on the most basic of human levels. This is a truly global art, in which Murakami has formulated an artistic language whose vocabulary is immediately understandable and relevant to Western and Eastern audiences alike. The driving force behind Murakami’s art and indeed Pink Summer appears to be for the sake of beauty. "I have always wanted to create beautiful things….It is because beauty gives reality to the fantasy that when they stand before it everyone is equal, if only for a moment." (Takashi Murakami in Exhibition Catalogue, Tokyo, Museum of Contemporary Art, Takashi Murakami: Summon Monsters? Open the door? Heal? Or Die?, 2001, pp.130 and 147)