Celebrating his 1500th piece in Paris at the top of Contemporary Art Museum Centre Pompidou, the French artist Invader is taking over an entire building in central Paris and transforming it into a space station: the INVADER SPACE STATION.
Located 11 rue Béranger (75003) in the former offices of the newspaper ‘Libération’ ( which were invaded by the artist back in 2011), the exhibition is curated by Fabrice Bousteau, editorial director of Beaux Arts Magazine.
This massive exhibition of 3500 m² accross nine floors will feature pictures, videos, sculptures and installations. So get ready to be invaded.
A major new exhibition exploring the irresistible force of cuteness in contemporary culture will be opening at the Somerset House in London from 25 January to 14 April 2024 .
Starting of with the celebration of the cat, to the influence of the japanese culture of cuteness ‘Kawaii’, CUTE brings together contemporary artworks, including new artist commissions, and cultural phenomena such as music, fashion, toys, video games and social media.
From emojis to internet memes, video games to plushie toys, food to loveable robotic design, cuteness has taken over our world. But how has something so charming and seemingly harmless – adorable, doe-eyed animals, chubby-cheeked babies, flowers, hearts, stars, sweets and other such romantic motifs – gained such traction?
Examining the world’s embrace of cute culture and how it has become such an influential measure of our times, the exhibition will seek to unravel cuteness’ emotive charge, revealing its extraordinary and complex power and potential.
Contributing artists include Mark Leckey, Sean-Kierre Lyons, Aya Takano, Mike Kelley, Karen Kilimnik, Nayland Blake, Cosima von Bonin, Hannah Diamond, Ed Fornieles, Juliana Huxtable, Rachel Maclean, Julien Ceccaldi, Paige K. B., Isaac Lythgoe, Alake Shilling, Wong Ping, Liv Preston, CFGNY, Ram Han, Maggie Lee, Bunny Rogers, Flannery Silva, Andy Holden, plus Somerset House Studios artists Chris Zhongtian Yuan, Sin Wai Kin and Sian Fan.
The exhibition will also feature a games arcade for all ages and will spotlight and celebrate the 50th anniversary of one of cute’s most iconic and ubiquitous figures, Hello Kitty, in partnership with Sanrio.
Understanding the New Cognitive Domain, is the first exhibition of work by Japanese artist Takashi Murakami at the Gagosian Gallery in Le Bourget, main private air hub on the outskirts of Paris, France.
Focused on his monumental paintings. The exhibition features five such works plus others in smaller formats and several sculptures.
Murakami wanted to offer the French public a window on Japanese history, the history of Asia, creating bridges between Western culture and Eastern culture, the digital world and the real world, abstract art and figurative art.
Two monumental frescoes welcome the visitors upon entering the gigantic warehouse gallery space. A new 5 x 23-meter painting by Murakami is based on the iwai-maku, or stage curtain, that he produced for the Kabuki-za theater in Ginza, Tokyo.
The frescoe titled ‘The Name Succession of Ichikawa Danjūrō XIII, Hakuen, Kabuki Jūhachiban (2023)’ pays tribute to traditional Japanese Kabuki theater, and specially the stage name Ichikawa Danjūrō XIII, Hakuen by Japanese Kabuki actor and producer Ichikawa Ebizō XI.
Stage names, which specify an actor’s style and lineage, are passed down through generations and the Ichikawa family has a roughly 350-year history. Murakami’s design, which was commissioned by film director Takashi Miike, was unveiled during the first performance of Ichikawa Shinnosuke VIII at the November Kichirei Kaomise Grand Kabuki Theater program earlier in November 2022.
The second monumental painting, Dragon in Clouds – Indigo Blue (2010), is a reference to eccentric Japanese artist Soga Shōhaku’s Dragon and Clouds (1763). Shōhaku’s work is a multi-panel Unryūzu (cloud-and-dragon) painting in which the creature appears as a Buddhist symbol of optimism and good fortune. Murakami’s painting resonates with contemporary Japanese visual culture, particularly the video game Blue Dragon, while its vast scale revives the visceral and psychological impact of Shōhaku’s masterpiece.
In the second space, two frescoes respond to each other, like a distorting mirror: one is the perfect illustration of the Superflat style (a movement halfway between pop art and Japanese kawaii culture invented by Murakami in the 2000s), and the other features sunflowers in a marbled effect.
Between traditional art and contemporary art, Murakami’s heart swings. He recently became interested in cryptoart, and he even launched his own NFT project, Murakami Flowers, last year. “During the pandemic, I really felt that the line between the real and digital world was becoming more and more blurred, and I think NFTs are the artistic expression of this permeability. I create NFTs to insert myself into this metaverse and then make real paintings to explain the world of NFTs to people in the real world . ”
Also on view are several “lucky cat” paintings that reference the artist’s recent NFT projects, and other works featuring Murakami’s iconic smiling flower motif—including a two-meter rainbow neon sign—in which the artist again employs a retro-digital variant on his influential Superflat aesthetic.
Two mirror-plated figures representing futuristic anime-style avatars reinvest the Clone X NFTs (2021) that Murakami developed in collaboration with RTFKT Studios with physical presence, reflecting his fascination with the metaverse and his sensitivity to the hybrid nature of agency in today’s world.
His ever-proliferating cartoonlike blossoms function as immediately recognizable and infinitely flexible icons that may be at once ornamental and symbolic, directing the viewer toward intertwined themes of identity, representation, and technology.
The exhibition shows the full extent of Murakami’s talent and his artistic references, ranging from the masters of the Edo period (1603-1867) to the aesthetics of video games through American abstract artists.
Understanding the New Cognitive Domain is on view through December 22 @ Gagosian Le Bourget
New Clear Power, Shepard Fairey’s first solo exhibition in Germany addresses systems, forms, and notions of power in at the newly opened AMuseum , dedicated to the street art movement. The Amuseum was initiated by the artistic group Positive Propaganda, led by Sebastian Pohl and Overrated Art Inc.
For this exhibition Shepard Fairey decided to use a wide range of mediums (from mixed-media paintings on canvas, stencils, collage, illustrations, and prints) and juxtaposes colours with images, patterns and text, and feature icons like Keith Haring, Greta Thunberg and Edward Snowden to convey clear messages and raise questions as well as voice concerns about various notions of power.
The concepts of power represented in the subject matter of New Clear Power include abuse of power, power concentrated under capitalism, renewable power, political power, the power of creativity, power over information, and the power of controlling narrative. A primary focus of the work is a critique of fossil fuel industries and their contribution to climate change and environmental decline.
In parallel to the exhibition Shepard Fairey and his team with the help of Positive Propaganda, painted a 115 meters wide mural along a stretch of Munich’s city highway, featuring images relating to the oil industry and the urgency of transitioning to renewable sources of power.
Photo: Positive Propaganda e.V.
Until 30 April 2023
AMUSEUM of Contemporary Art, Schellingstrasse 3, 80799 München
American artist KAWS is currently exhibiting at Skarstedt Gallery in Paris. TIME OFF marks the culmination of a series of paintings started in 2020, at the height of the confinement, and features a new large scale bronze sculpture.
The works on view in TIME OFF are introspective and reflect on the transient nature of time. In each painting, KAWS’s signature Michelin’s man character CHUM appears before the viewer with complex configurations of bright bands of paint acting as an additional barrier between us and the figure, with the notion of time feeling constricting or isolating.
This series depict KAWS’s interpretation on personal confinement and the passing of time and the uncertainty of events.
As KAWS continues to delve into these themes, the paintings in this series become progressively more elaborate and, at times, chaotic, which draw the parallel on the events we are experiencing.
In some works the bars break free of their architecturally rendered confines and shoot out in all directions across the canvas, causing CHUM to duck down or become shrouded by them, respectively. Other paintings reflects the uncertainty of how to navigate the space we inhabit.
Despite the persistence of doubt in these works, KAWS leaves his viewers with a palpable optimism for the future with the use of bright and vivid colours. Not all hope is lost. Despite confusing and uncertain times, the aim is to seek artistic beauty and make the most of what is around you.
Until 22 April 2023, Skarstedt Gallery, 2 Avenue Matignon, 75008 Paris
