Yoshitomo Nara First International Retrospective of the Artist
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
March 2020 Fact Sheets: New Coronavirus Outbreak Japan to quarantine visitors from China and South Korea / State of emergency Recording the legacy of Japanese art declared in Los Angeles amid coronavirus outbreak / 9,200+: Number of and culture for next generations people self-monitoring who returned to the U.S. through SFO or LA Page 4, 5, 6 Los Angeles County Museum of Art Yoshitomo Nara First international retrospective of the artist Yoshitomo Nara Miss Forest, 2010 Ceramic decorated with platinum, gold, and silver liquid 144 x 102 x 100 cm Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art © Yoshitomo Nara 2010 photo by Keizo Kioku courtesy of the artist Yoshitomo Nara My Drawing Room, 2008 Mixed media 301.5 x 375 x 380 cm Yoshitomo Nara, Miss Spring, 2012, Acrylic on canvas, 227 x 182 cm, Collection of collection of the artist Yokohama Museum of Art, © Yoshitomo Nara 2012, photo by Keizo Kioku, courtesy © Yoshitomo Nara 2008 of the artist. photo by Mie Morimoto courtesy of the artist April 5 – August 23, 2020 are vaguely ominous-looking characters an installation that recreates his draw- “Yoshitomo Nara is among the most BCAM, Level 2 with penetrating gazes that occasionally ing studio, and never-beforeexhibited important Japanese artists of his gen- Los Angeles County Museum of Art wield objects just as knives or ciga- idea sketches that reflect the artist’s eration, and one of the most recognized 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, rettes, as well as heads and figures that empathic eye. artists working today. We are excited Los Angeles, CA, 90036 lacma.org float in dreamy landscapes. One of the exhibition highlights to be organizing this international Nara’s oeuvre reflects the artist’s includes Miss Forest, a 26-foot outdoor retrospective,” said Michael Govan, The Los Angeles County Museum raw encounters with his inner self, tak- painted bronze sculpture that will be LACMA CEO and Wallis Annenberg of Art (LACMA) presents Yoshitomo ing inspiration from memories of his installed on Wilshire Boulevard. Director. Nara, the first international retrospec- childhood; music; literature; studying Following LACMA’s presentation, “Nara’s art reflects his interest in art tive of artist Yoshitomo Nara (b. 1959). and living in Germany (1988–2000); the exhibition will travel to the Yuz and culture of both past and present. The exhibition surveys more than 30 exploring his roots in Asia; and modern Museum, Shanghai (September 29, His interest in art history—ranging years of the artist’s work—from 1984 art from Europe and Japan. 2020–January 17, 2021), the Museo from 12th-century Japanese Buddhist to 2020—through the lens of his long- Yoshitomo Nara comprises more Guggenheim Bilbao (February–May sculptures and handscroll paintings, time passion to music. than 100 major works, including 2021); and the Kunsthal Rotterdam Italian early-Renaissance painters, and Known for his portraits, Nara’s subjects paintings, drawings, sculpture, ceramics, (June–September 2021). Please turn to page 2 2 Cultural News March 2020-Reiwa 2 Los Angeles County Museum of Art Yoshitomo Nara First international retrospective of the artist Continued from page 1 music filters throughout his practice. words “Place Like Home” hangs on other European modern influences— After taking several lengthy journeys the exterior, and the inside features mirrors LACMA’s encyclopedic to Europe in 1980, 1983, and 1987 piles of drawings on the floor and a nature. Referencing contemporary mu- while attending art school at Aichi Pre- desk with figurines, mix CDs that Nara sic and album covers, Nara possesses fectural University of the Arts where curated, vernacular paintings, draw- the unique ability to capture a com- he obtained his BA and MA, Nara was ings, ephemera, and collectibles from plexity of emotions that reflects the accepted into the Kunstakademie vintage Americana shops that the artist cultural psyche of the current genera- Düsseldorf and lived in Germany from has accumulated over the years. tion.” 1988 to 2000 Starting in 2005, Nara’s singular Exhibition curator Mika Yoshitake (Düsseldorf from 1988 to 1993 and portraits began to take a dramatic turn, stated, “Music has been a passion for in Cologne until 2000). each projecting a complex expression Nara since he began to listen to folk This was a period of great isolation that combines sadness, anger, and songs at age nine, and his relationship for Nara, during which he was remind- serenity. with music, namely with album cover ed of his adolescent years in Aomori, In Missing in Action – Girl Meets art, provided him with an unconven- and the development of psychological Boy (2005), fire from an atomic bomb tional introduction to art history and depth and introspection in his paint- explosion is reflected in one of the eyes artistic genres. This passion is seen ings. While Nara’s immense popularity of the figure, representing a memory of through Nara’s vast record collection, within the Neo-Pop milieu has domi- Hiroshima, where this work is housed. selections of which visitors will see as nated the critical global reception of The political valence of this work soon as they enter this exhibition. his practice to this day, having spent on paper connects the fading memory Through more than 100 works on view, his formative years as a young artist in of the previous generation who experi- the exhibition will bring new light to Germany, Nara sees his work more in enced the war with the younger Nara’s conceptual process.” dialogue with American and European generation of Japanese youth who can The exhibition is accompanied by a subcultures. only indirectly experience this decisive fully illustrated catalogue with a fore- moment. Yoshitomo Nara, No Nukes, 1998, Acrylic and word by Michael Govan, introductory Exhibition Highlights colored pencil on paper, 36 x 22.5 cm, collection of Nara’s work took a dramatic shift essay by Mika Yoshitake, and text by Masayuki Nagase, © Yoshitomo Nara 1998, photo following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake Yoshitomo Nara. A limited-edition of Highlights from the Yoshitomo Nara by Norihiro Ueno, courtesy of the artist. and tsunami and the Fukushima Dai- the catalogue features a clamshell case exhibition include: ichi nuclear disaster, which occurred with 14 booklets, as well as a vinyl LP No Nukes (1998) depicts a stern, only 43 miles north of his studio. with original music and covers by pigtailed girl holding placard that American indie rock band Yo La Tengo reads, “No Nukes.” Painted over a pro- on side A and songs from the 1960s and motional poster for bossa nova ’70s selected by the artist on side B. musician Vinicius Cantuária’s Amor Nara’s love of music ended up pro- Brasileiro (1998) among other printed viding him with an unorthodox art ephemera, it became powerful symbol education: the images on record covers in July 2012 when the artist allowed not only became signifiers for music protesters to download a high-resolu- but also introduced him to a vast array tion image of the work to use as picket of artistic genres, with covers and their signs during one of Japan’s largest an- corresponding music merging in his ti-nuclear protests. subconscious. As many as 100,000 people gath- For the young Nara, growing up in ered to rail against the government’s Japan among the shadows of war and decision to restart two nuclear reactors economic recovery, the records and in Fukui prefecture, many with this im- their covers served as sources of es- age, dubbed “No Nukes Girl,” in hand. cape and eventually as a valuable form Yoshitomo Nara, The Girl with the Knife in Her of self-empowerment, allowing him to Hand, 1991, Acrylic on canvas, 150.5 x 140 com, Fountain of Life (2001/2014) is a Vicki and Kent Logan, fractional and promised motorized sculptural installation of deal with the complexities of living gift to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, © with the remnants of Japan’s imperial Yoshitomo Nara 1991, photo by Ikuhiro Watanabe, heads with closed eyelids that tower past and in close proximity to signs of courtesy of the artist. over one another inside an enormous ongoing conflict. cup with water that streams down the Today, Nara’s studio wall displays a Girl with a Knife in Her Hand figures’ cheeks, forming a fountain of Yoshitomo Nara, Milky Lakes/Thinking One, vast array of records he has accumu- (1991) is one of the most iconic works tears. 2011, Acrylic on canvas, 259.2 x 181.8 cm, Private Collection, courtesy of Frahm & Frahm, © lated over the past 40 years, including in Nara’s oeuvre, focusing on a single, The melancholy of this work is Yoshitomo Nara, 2011, photo by Keizo Kioku, folk, rock, blues, soul, and punk al- ominous figure with eyes who floats in palpable, and the figures’ clean profiles courtesy of the artist. bums. an empty atmosphere. evoke the richly outlined paintings of This exhibition aims to move away Representing a turning point in Japanese abstract painter Morikazu Emotionally affected by the after- from some of the dominant perceptions which Nara no longer illustrates the Kumagai, whom Nara has long ad- math, Nara painted In the Milky of Nara’s work with Japan’s Neo-Pop backgrounds of his artworks, but in- mired. Lake/Thinking One (2011), a portrait movement (largely associated with Ta- stead concentrates on the figures Nara began creating portable instal- of a solemn girl with closed eyelids kashi Murakami), and also shift the themselves, the artist intensifies their lations of his paintings, drawings, and who wears a green dress and is half- focus from the harshness and intensity gazes by experimenting with sideways sculptures, which ranged from the submerged in a barely visible pool of of his earlier practice to the self-critical stances and slightly off-center place- three-part installation S.M.L.