Kawaii - vacances d'été
2002
Acrylic on canvas, wood, 6 pannels
Overall dimensions: 300 x 900 x 7 cm (118 1/8 x 354 5/16 x 2 3/4 in.)
A host of colourful, hilarious flowers stretch out across a three-metre-high, nine-metre-long set of six panels. The impression of a large crowd of anthropomorphic flowers gives Kawaii –Vacances d’été (Kawaii-Summer holiday, "kawaii" meaning "cute" in Japanese) an almost hallucinatory power.
The polyptych flower pattern is typical of Takashi Murakami's work. These moving crowds with frozen expressions on their faces envelop the viewer in a world similar to that of Japanese mangas, a cross between the cutesy and the anxiety-provoking. The work’s monumental, decorative flatness also refers to the art of folding screens, whose decors sometimes seek to make us aware of the transience of things.
Kawaii –Vacances d’été was shown for the first time by the Pinault Collection during the 2009 exhibition "Mapping the Studio" at the Palazzo Grassi.
The polyptych flower pattern is typical of Takashi Murakami's work. These moving crowds with frozen expressions on their faces envelop the viewer in a world similar to that of Japanese mangas, a cross between the cutesy and the anxiety-provoking. The work’s monumental, decorative flatness also refers to the art of folding screens, whose decors sometimes seek to make us aware of the transience of things.
Kawaii –Vacances d’été was shown for the first time by the Pinault Collection during the 2009 exhibition "Mapping the Studio" at the Palazzo Grassi.
Exhibitions
©. Takashi Murakami/Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved
Courtesy Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin
Photo : André Morin
