Art Study 1

This acrylic painting approximately nine feet by eleven feet is titled And Then, And Then And Then And Then And Then (Blue) and is painted on canvas and mounted on board. There are variations of this same painting in several different colors. It features Takashi Murakami’s signature character, Mr. DOB. Mr. DOB is supposed to be partly based off a portrait of Murakami himself and a mouse and represents kawaii, the Japanese term for cuteness. However, in this painting Mr. DOB’s cuteness is questionable because of the large size of the image and his bare tooth grin. This might imply a pun on kawaii because of the similar sounding word kowai, meaning scary. The scariness in this piece isn’t pushed as far as in some of his other pieces such as GuruGuru (1998) and The Castle of Tin Tin (1998). This painting is different than Murakami’s other works because it’s not colorful and doesn’t look shiny and plastic. Yet it still encompasses his unique “superflat” style. It also draws a lot of characteristics from Japanese anime and manga such as having disproportional features, large eyes, and a cartoon-like type of drawing.

Mr. DOB is supposed to symbolize Murakami’s critical outlook on the meaningless consumer community. In my opinion, I found it more as a symbol of something bittersweet because of the color and the different angles that you can look at this piece. At some angles, he looks really happy, but at others, he looks weary and the blue color it reminds me of trying to be calm and happy while there’s worry going on inside. The twinkle in his eyes gives off a kind of hopeful feeling that something might just turn out okay. Since there aren’t many colors in this painting, it also gives it more of a dull mood compared to Murakami’s other works of art.

Works Cited

Ngai, Sianne. The Cuteness of the Avant-Garde. 2005. 28 October 2008
http://www-english.tamu.edu/pers/fac/eide/files/ngai.pdf.

Queensland Art Gallery. Queensland Art Gallery - Takashi Murakami. 2007. 28 October 2008 http://www.qag.qld.gov.au/collection/contemporary_asian_art/takashi_murakami.