Exhibited at the Vancouver Art Gallery, Juxtapoz x Superflat was a show co-curated by Murakami, whose illustrations are often shown in gallery spaces, though he too retains a strong entrepreneurial sense. Directly drawn from traditionally flat Japanese imagery, Murakami’s superflat aesthetic appeals directly to otaku and kawaii culture, otaku as a fan-based subculture and kawaii as a culture of cuteness (Laurence). He views these cultures as a specific response to the trauma of Japanese people, from the Hiroshima disaster back in the second World War (Laurence). This can be seen in counterpoint to western art. Mid twentieth century, the impossibility of objectively illustrating (the horror of) the world led to many western artists moving away
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Murakami’s use of a flat aesthetic relates to a flattening between high and low culture, a flattening that he is very conscious and purposeful about (Weigand). With a range of of artworks or products set at various prices, he makes a point of allowing anyone to be able to own an original Murakami (Weigand). Both as an artist and curator, he pushes for art to just be art, not high or low (Ly). Also seeking to bridge the gap between high and low culture, Hot Art Wet City aims to be a friendly, accessible gallery space that provides a stepping stone to higher end galleries (Dickieson 28). Somehow, in all this, illustration has been grouped with low culture, even when included in the category of fine …show more content…
One feature that illustrations generally share, that paintings and drawings categorized by themselves don’t, is that illustrations are often made with the intent that they will be reproduced and distributed. Even before the process of digitally copying artwork became so much easier, Walter Benjamin theorized that “the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility” (6). If that is the case, the entire nature of illustration no longer depends on authenticity or originality, and perhaps it never did. Benjamin also posits that a reproduction of a painting or a drawing can never encapsulate the experience of it in space and time, but that the aura of the work of art will decline in the age of mechanical reproduction (4). Many artists have fought against the perceived value or at the very least, questioned it critically; we can think back to the postmodern period, as much of the work created was a direct push against focusing on originality, such as illustrator turned artist Andy Warhol (Smithsonian). In 1966, Mel Bochner curated the exhibit Working Drawings and Other Visible Things on Paper Not Necessarily Meant to Be Viewed as Art where photocopied paper ephemera produced by artists was placed in ring bound folders on plinths (Vitamin D, 7). It raised the
Murakami’s use of a flat aesthetic relates to a flattening between high and low culture, a flattening that he is very conscious and purposeful about (Weigand). With a range of of artworks or products set at various prices, he makes a point of allowing anyone to be able to own an original Murakami (Weigand). Both as an artist and curator, he pushes for art to just be art, not high or low (Ly). Also seeking to bridge the gap between high and low culture, Hot Art Wet City aims to be a friendly, accessible gallery space that provides a stepping stone to higher end galleries (Dickieson 28). Somehow, in all this, illustration has been grouped with low culture, even when included in the category of fine …show more content…
One feature that illustrations generally share, that paintings and drawings categorized by themselves don’t, is that illustrations are often made with the intent that they will be reproduced and distributed. Even before the process of digitally copying artwork became so much easier, Walter Benjamin theorized that “the work of art reproduced becomes the work of art designed for reproducibility” (6). If that is the case, the entire nature of illustration no longer depends on authenticity or originality, and perhaps it never did. Benjamin also posits that a reproduction of a painting or a drawing can never encapsulate the experience of it in space and time, but that the aura of the work of art will decline in the age of mechanical reproduction (4). Many artists have fought against the perceived value or at the very least, questioned it critically; we can think back to the postmodern period, as much of the work created was a direct push against focusing on originality, such as illustrator turned artist Andy Warhol (Smithsonian). In 1966, Mel Bochner curated the exhibit Working Drawings and Other Visible Things on Paper Not Necessarily Meant to Be Viewed as Art where photocopied paper ephemera produced by artists was placed in ring bound folders on plinths (Vitamin D, 7). It raised the