Martin Lawrence Galleries South Coast Plaza Proudly Presents Takashi Murakami

About

Takashi Murakami, known to many around the world as Japan’s Andy Warhol, ensures that each of his magnificent works of art reflects his craft and insightful engagement with popular culture, folklore and pop art style, all mixed with traditional Japanese culture. One of today's most imaginative artists, Murakami is universally recognized for both his fine art and commercial output - including collaborations with hip-hop stars Kanye West and Pharrell Williams, as well as designs for the fashion and beauty industry with Louis Vuitton, Issey Miyake, and Shu Uemura.

MLG's Electric Exhibition to be held in the South Coast Plaza Center at 3333 Bear Street, Costa Mesa, CA will showcase Murakami's colorful paintings and graphics which reveal the consistent, universal themes that have guided the artist's work.

Murakami, born and raised in Tokyo, Japan, was influenced by animated films (anime), comic books (manga), and global branding, and creates and adapts his recognizable characters into a style that he has dubbed “Superflat”-a tribute to the two-dimension style of classic Japanese cartoons. The theory posits that there is a legacy of flat, 2-dimensional imagery from Japanese Art history in manga and anime. 

"I am not a political artist; my target is children, I found my market, my sweet spot, Okay, this is my zone – for the kids"-, Takashi Murakami.

Takashi Murakami attended the Tokyo University of Arts where he acquired the drafting skills necessary to become an animator but eventually majored in Nihonga, the 'traditional style of Japanese painting that incorporates conventional artistic conventions, techniques, and subjects. In 1994, Murakami received a fellowship from the Asian Cultural Council and spent a year in the PS1 International Studio Program in New York City. During his stay, he was exposed to and highly inspired by Western contemporary artists and the art movement of Simulationism, which engages in a play of relationships between cells, icons and the increasing geometricization of the social space in the world in which we live. 

Murakami works have been exhibited in over 82 museums around the globe including the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan Society, New York, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, New York, Palace

of Versailles, Versailles, France, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow.  Most recently his first retrospective was installed at the Vancouver Art Gallery in Canada. This summer the Fort Worth Museum of Art will host the highly anticipated retrospective Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg, showcasing more than three decades of his spectacular works. 

Takashi Murakami is one of the family of superb 20th and 21stcentury artists, such as Warhol, Haring, Chagall, Picasso and Miró that MLG proudly offers at their fine art galleries located in nine cities including New York, New Orleans, Maui, La Jolla, Costa Mesa, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, and Las Vegas.

Martin Lawrence Galleries

Opening Reception, Saturday, June 8th from 6–8 PM

South Coast Plaza

3333 Bear Street

Costa Mesa, CA 92626

WWW.MARTINLAWRENCE.COM

SOUTHCOAST@MARTINLAWRENCE.COM

About Martin Lawrence Galleries

Since 1978, Martin Lawrence Galleries (MLG)-headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut with nine gallery locations nationwide including New York, Chicago, Dallas, Las Vegas, New Orleans, San Francisco, Costa Mesa, La Jolla, Maui has been assisting and advising collectors as they consider acquiring fine art.  (MLG), has prided and defined ourselves as both publishers of fine art prints and sculpture from the most talented contemporary artists-both North American and European-and home to modern and contemporary masters like Picasso, Chagall, Warhol, Calder, Magritte, Basquiat, and Murakami. We are extremely proud to have lent and exhibited over 200 masterworks, created by more than 30 different artists, to 30+ world-class museums around the globe…including the Louvre, the Pompidou, the Metropolitan, the Whitney, the National Gallery, the Tate and the Hermitage- where we are the sole sponsor of the first ever exhibition of the work of Erté, the father of art deco and we proudly publish works by artists including Kondakova, Hallam, Bertho, Fressinier, Lalonde andDeyber. For more information visit martinlawrence.com

For further information and images contact:

Katia Graytok

kgraytok@martinlawrence.com

T. 203.989.2073