The Superflat Sensei

"I Express Hopelessness" is the famous quote by one of the most prolific and thought-provoking Japanese artists of the 90s,Takashi Murakami,who was born in Tokyo in 1963. Murakami works in both fine arts as well as digital and commercial media. His work ranges from cartoon paintings and minimalist sculptures to factory-produced watches and tshirts. Most of his work comes along with his signature character, Mr. DOB. Murakami has the tendency to draw popular themes from mass media and japanese pop culture, and then turn them into thirty-foot sculptures, his trademark Superflat paintings and different kinds of commercial goods. The idea of creating art in non-fine arts media was spawned by Murakami's personal opinion about his own country's low status when it comes to art, as he thought that the japanese market was nothing more than a western appropriation. Murakami is an avid supporter of the otaku culture, a term used to describe people in Japan that have an obssession with video games,manga and anime, which according to Murakami himself is more representative of modern day Japanese life. His passion about otaku led to the creation of Superflat, a concept that came to life from Poku, a combination of pop and otaku, and is highly characterized by flat planes of color and graphic images involving a character style derived from anime and manga. The main theme of Superflat is to promote the otaku lifestyle and subculture. Murakami's work's connection with themes of the underground and alternative cultures is shown in one of the most popular examples of his Superflat paintings called "Smooth Nightmare", a piece which exhibits the mushroom being one of his recurring motifs. Murakami is also a sculptor and a graphic designer himself creating life size or even taller figures made out of fiberglass such as the famous "Miss ko2" and "Tongari Kun" pieces that were sold in overwelmingly high prices in auctions in 2009 and 2010 respectively,as well as creating the artwork for Kanye West's album Graduation. His work has been exhibited in museums all over the world, including the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and the Bard College Museum of Art, and he had the honor of being the only visual artist included in Time magazine's "100 Most Influential People" list in 2008.