The recent exhibit at the Yokohoma Museum of Art is by Yoshitomo Nara whose sculpture ""Big White Ghost" is pictured above. My first exposure to his art was through album covers he made for artists like Shonen Knife and The Ramones (there was homage to them in one of his paintings "Hey Ho, Let's Go"). Not long after that he wa one of the featured artists in the collaborative "Super Flat" exhibition I saw at the Henry Art Gallery on the UW campus in 2000. Then in 2004 I saw his exhibition entitles "From the Depth of My Drawer" at the Hara Art Museum in Shinagawa. This time he added large metal sculptures to his repertoire and had many interesting paintings as well. Some of the drawings looked like they were dashed off in no time though. I liked most of his large scale paintings and those that were painted on wood surfaces. One of the more interesting ones was called "Can't Wait 'till Night Comes" which featured one of his child-like characters revealing a single vampire fang. I don't think the paintings/drawings on cardboard were as effective-they looked tossed off as well. However, Nara reveals humor with pieces like the room that had a shelf of Jesus statues with miniature bags over the heads with eyes drawn in. Another painting of a decapitated Hitler read "He's Bad, I'm Good." There were some odd blank spaces on the walls, which makes me wonder if he was supposed to have created more for the exhibition. The accompanying exhibition had several of his earlier works among classic and contemporary paintings from all over the world and with quite a few famous names like Picasso, Bacon, and others.
Sausage and beer cart in front of the museum-inspired by one of Nara's paintings.
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