'Black Circle (円相トートãƒãƒƒã‚¯)' by Takashi Murakami, 2022
18.75 x 15.5 x 6 Inches (tote)
15.7 x 14.6 x 1.3 Inches (framed)
Screen-printed 100% cotton canvas tote bag.
Open Edition (Sold Out).
*Note: gallery wrapped and custom shadow-box framed in white hardwood molding.

ABOUT THE ART

A Japanese EnsŠ(円相) is a circle that is hand-drawn in one or two uninhibited brushstrokes to express a moment when the mind is free to let the body create.

ARTIST BIO

Takashi Murakami was born in 1962 in Tokyo, Japan. He studied at Tokyo University of the Arts, Japan, (formerly, Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music), where he received his B.F.A. in 1986, his M.F.A. in 1988, and his P.h.D. in 1993. He founded the Hiropon factory in Tokyo in 1996, which later evolved into Kaikai Kiki, an art production and art management corporation.

In addition to the production and marketing of Murakami's art and related work, Kaikai Kiki functions as a supportive environment for the fostering of emerging artists.

A lightning rod between different cultural valencies (high/low, ancient/modern, oriental/occidental), Takashi Murakami has stated that the artist is someone who understands the borders between worlds and who makes an effort to know them.

With his distinctive “Superflat” style and ethos, which employs highly refined classical Japanese painting techniques to depict a super-charged mix of Pop, animé and otaku content within a flattened representational picture-plane, he moves freely within an ever-expanding field of aesthetic issues and cultural inspirations.

Parallel to utopian and dystopian themes, he recollects and revitalizes narratives of transcendence and enlightenment, often involving outsider-savants. Mining religious and secular subjects favored by the so-called Japanese "eccentrics" or non-conformist artists of the Early Modern era commonly considered to be counterparts of the Western Romantic tradition, Murakami situates himself within their legacy of bold and lively individualism in a manner that is entirely his own and of his time.
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Good/New (See Photos)

15.7 x 14.7 x 1.3 in