art attack...

Japanese Art and Vocab Primer: It's so Kawaii!

Internationally renowned Japanese artist Takashi Murakami curated Little Boy: The Arts of Japan's Exploding Subculture currently at the Japan Society through July, which according to their site "explores the astoundingly popular phenomenon called otaku, a Japanese youth subculture obsessed with fantastic and apocalyptic science fiction, fantasy, video games, comic books (manga) and film animation (anime)." The Little Birdie thinks themes of extreme nostalgia and childishness are fascinating and popular with artists of our generation.

Fredeekians should look for public artwork that goes along with this show at the following locations. The Little Birdie cannot wait to see Chihi Aoshima's digital murals at Union Square!

1) Subway placards by Chiho Aoshima, Aya Takano, Hideaki Kawashima, and Noboru Tsubaki



2) Chinatsu Ban's V W X Yellow Elephant Underwear/H I J Kiddy Elephant at 5th & 60th Street:
FYI, also from the site: The Japanese word for “cute” is “kawaii.” The Japanese teen magazine CREA once noted that kawaii is “the most widely used, widely loved, habitual word in modern living Japanese.” Anything can be made cute, even, in this case, a pile of elephant poop.



3) Chiho Aoshima's large-scale digital murals at UNION SQUARE SUBWAY:
City Glow, installed near the N-R subway lines
Paradise, appears near the 4, 5 and 6



More on Little Boy: www.japansociety.org/

More on NYC's public art: www.publicartfund.org/

More on Murakami: www.takashimurakami.com/