Superflat
Description
Superflat is a postmodern art movement, founded by Japanese contemporary artist Takashi Murakami, which is influenced by manga and anime. However, superflat does not have an explicit definition because Takashi Murakami does not want to limit the movement, but rather leave room for it to grow and evolve over time.
Superflat is also the name of a 2000 art exhibition, curated by Murakami, that toured West Hollywood, Minneapolis and Seattle.
"Superflat" is used by Murakami to refer to various flattened forms in Japanese graphic art, animation, pop culture and fine arts, as well as the "shallow emptiness of Japanese consumer culture." Superflat has been embraced by American artists, who have created a hybrid called "SoFlo Superflat". Read more ↗
Key Artists
Takashi Murakami
Founder and mastermind of the Superflat art movement who curated the defining 2000 traveling exhibition and formulated its philosophy linking traditional Japanese flatness to post-war otaku consumerism.
Yoshitomo Nara
Internationally celebrated Superflat painter whose deceptively childlike depictions of rebellious, big-eyed children merge punk rock attitude with traditional ukiyo-e flatness.
Aya Takano
Key Kaikai Kiki collective painter and manga artist whose floating, androgynous female figures blend science fiction, eroticism, and traditional Japanese linear aesthetics.
Chiho Aoshima
Prominent Superflat digital artist and animator whose monumental murals and multi-channel video installations create surreal landscapes filled with spirits, schoolgirls, and apocalyptic nature.
Mr. (artist)
Core Kaikai Kiki painter and sculptor whose work unabashedly channels anime, lolicon aesthetics, and otaku bedroom fantasies as a sincere reflection of personal subculture.
Bome (sculptor)
Renowned Japanese otaku figure sculptor featured in Murakami's inaugural 2000 Superflat exhibition, elevating commercial bishōjo anime statuettes into fine art gallery objects.
Famous Artworks
Fun Facts
Takashi Murakami coined the term 'Superflat' to draw a direct historical continuum between the flat, two-dimensional composition of Edo-period ukiyo-e woodblock prints and contemporary Japanese anime and manga aesthetics.
↗ Source: en.wikipedia.org
In 2000, when Murakami curated the original 'Superflat' exhibition at MoCA Los Angeles and the Walker Art Center, he deliberately exhibited fine art paintings right alongside commercial otaku anime figurines crafted by sculptor Bome, erasing the boundary between high art and subculture.
↗ Source: en.wikipedia.org