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Murakami & Abloh

“TECHNICOLOR 2”

June 23–July 28, 2018
rue de Ponthieu, Paris

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Installation video

Works Exhibited

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018 Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018

Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)
© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018 Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018

Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)
© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018 Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, “TIMES NATURE”, 2018

Acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 59 ⅛ × 59 ⅛ inches (150 × 150 cm)
© Virgil Abloh and © Takashi Murakami

About

We want to see the newest things. That is because we want to see the future, even if only momentarily. It is the moment in which, even if we don’t completely understand what we have glimpsed, we are nonetheless touched by it. This is what we have come to call art.
—Takashi Murakami

We are driven by an innate ambition to make artworks that are shaped by societal observations—in a variety of media—which by their existence produce a new cultural impact.
—Virgil Abloh

Gagosian is pleased to present new collaborative works by Takashi Murakami and Virgil Abloh, following their first exhibition, future history, at Gagosian London.

During their recent collaboration, Murakami and Abloh have produced works in which their respective styles and trademarks intersect in a stream of freewheeling, punkish mash-ups. In this exhibition, new iterations of the “TIMES NATURE” (2018) paintings include multimedia works such as “animated” and illuminated paintings, which play on cultural references, ideas of production and reproduction, and concepts of linear time. Two sculptures will be included in the exhibition: in “LIFE ITSELF” (2018), an oversize three-dimensional iteration of Murakami’s smiling flower motif sits in the open doorway of a greenhouse-like structure, expressively spray-painted in black; and in “OUR OUTER SPACE” (2018), Mr. DOB, one of Murakami’s many invented characters, emerges from Abloh’s signature four-point arrow logo. The two artists, kindred spirits from different sectors of a broader cultural zone, reflect incisively on the signs of the times in which we live, while working to disrupt the stratifications of cultural production.

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Nous voulons voir ce qu’il y a de plus contemporain. C’est parce que nous voulons voir le futur, même pour un court instant. C’est le moment où, même si nous ne comprenons pas totalement ce que nous avons aperçu, nous en sommes malgré tout affectés. C’est ce que nous avons appelé art.
—Takashi Murakami

Nous sommes habités par l’intention fondamentale de faire des oeuvres d’art qui sont formées par l’observation de la société – dans une variété de formats – et qui par leur seule existence produisent un impact culturel nouveau.
—Virgil Abloh

Gagosian est heureuse de présenter de nouvelles oeuvres collaboratives par Takashi Murakami et Virgil Abloh, après leur première exposition future history à Gagosian Londres.

Au cours de leur récente collaboration, Murakami et Abloh ont produit des oeuvres dans lesquelles leurs styles respectifs et leurs signes caractéristiques se croisent dans un flux de liberté, aux mashups à l’esprit punk. Dans cette exposition, de nouvelles peintures “TIMES NATURE” (2018) et des oeuvres multimédias, animées et illuminées se jouent des références culturelles, le concept de production et de reproduction, et l’idée de temps linéaire. Deux sculptures seront inclues dans l’exposition : dans “LIFE ITSELF” (2018), une version surdimensionnée en trois dimensions de l’emblématique fleur rieuse de Murakami est disposée à l’entrée d’une structure semblable à une serre, peinte au spray noir.

Dans “OUR OUTER SPACE” (2018), Mr. DOB, l’un des nombreux personnages inventés par Murakami émerge du logo à quatre pointes fléchées de Abloh. Les deux artistes, esprits très liés venant de différents horizons au coeur d’un paysage culturel plus large, mènent une réflexion incisive sur les signes de l’époque dans laquelle nous vivons, et contribuent à bouleverser les stratifications de la production culturelle.

Dans son oeuvre protéiforme, Murakami tire son inspiration d’influences aussi diverses que la peinture japonaise traditionnelle, la culture otaku, la théorie de l’art occidentale, le cinéma hollywoodien et le hip-hop. Sa production artistique étendue trouve sa source dans la mode, le cinéma, les marchandises commerciales qu’elles soient luxueuses ou bon marché, effaçant ainsi les divisions tranchées entre art établi et culture pop.

Abloh, architecte et ingénieur de formation, articule son travail à travers la mode, l’architecture, la performance et les produits de consommation, tout en souvent déconstruisant le processus créatif en public pour défier autant qu’analyser les systèmes esthétiques existants et leurs modes de distribution. La marque street-couture Off-White qu’il a fondée en  allie des coupes conventionnelles à des références subversives.

Les artistes seront présents au vernissage de l’exposition.

A Takashi Murakami painting of a female avatar with blue and pink hair: CLONE X #59 Harajuku-style Angel

Takashi Murakami and RTFKT: An Arrow through History

Bridging the digital and the physical realms, the three-part presentation of paintings and sculptures that make up Takashi Murakami: An Arrow through History at Gagosian, New York, builds on the ongoing collaboration between the artist and RTFKT Studios. Here, Murakami and the RTFKT team explain the collaborative process, the necessity of cognitive revolution, the metaverse, and the future of art to the Quarterly’s Wyatt Allgeier.

Takashi Murakami cover and Andreas Gursky cover for Gagosian Quarterly, Summer 2022 magazine

Now available
Gagosian Quarterly Summer 2022

The Summer 2022 issue of Gagosian Quarterly is now available, with two different covers—featuring Takashi Murakami’s 108 Bonnō MURAKAMI.FLOWERS (2022) and Andreas Gursky’s V & R II (2022).

Takashi Murakami with works from his ceramics collection.

Murakami on Ceramics

Takashi Murakami writes about his commitment to the work of Japanese ceramic artists associated with the seikatsu kōgei, or lifestyle crafts, movement.

Takashi Murakami with his dog, Pom, Full Steam Ahead, Dark Matter in the Farthest Black Reaches of Visible Space, and Blue Flowers & Skulls (all 2012), Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd., studio, Saitama, Japan, 2012

In Conversation
Takashi Murakami and Hans Ulrich Obrist

Hans Ulrich Obrist interviews the artist on the occasion of his 2012 exhibition Takashi Murakami: Flowers & Skulls at Gagosian, Hong Kong.

Takashi Murakami at LACMA

Takashi Murakami at LACMA

In a conversation recorded at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Takashi Murakami describes the process behind three major large-scale paintings, including Qinghua (2019), inspired by the motifs painted on a Chinese Yuan Dynasty porcelain vase.

“AMERICA TOO”

“AMERICA TOO”

Join us for an exclusive look at the installation and opening reception of Murakami & Abloh: “AMERICA TOO”.

News

Photo: Claire Dorn

Artist Spotlight

Takashi Murakami

December 9–15, 2020

Takashi Murakami seamlessly blends commercial imagery, anime, manga, and traditional Japanese styles and subjects, revealing the themes and questions that connect past and present, East and West, technology and fantasy. His paintings, sculptures, and films are populated by repeated motifs and evolving characters of his own creation. Together with dystopian themes and contemporary references, he revitalizes narratives of transcendence in continuation of the nonconformist legacy of a group of eighteenth-century Japanese artists known as the Edo eccentrics.

Photo: Claire Dorn