(This article is by no means inclusive of everything in regards to Takashi Murakami; it is merely a glimpse into his life, art and multi-year relationship with Louis Vuitton. If you want to know more, visit the web, library or, my favorite, the LV boutique! I am not endorsing any sites or dealers below. Buy from whomever you wish at your own discretion.)
Ken Sakamoto's only 1963 U.S. hit is the title for this post, an apposite term to sum up this post's exploration of duality. Sukiyaki was originally "Ue o muite arukō" (Japanese for "[i] shall walk looking up"), which is exactly what you end up doing as you promenade along the mall in The District of Columbia during the spring. If you've never had the opportunity to see our nation's capitol in the early spring when the 3,000 cherry trees gifted to us from Japan in 1912 are in full bloom, I highly suggest you stop reading this post, pack and drive there now and camp until 2009 when their beauty returns. It's truly a splendid experience for all the senses: the smells of nature's renewal, the idle gait of families, couples and friends as they each soak in the majesty of the monuments to the ideals of equality and freedom; it really is overwhelming and enlivening against this backdrop of pink and blue. I've been twice and count both instances as supremely treasured events in my life due to my exquisite company. It's like walking around in a bubble gum dream where absolutely nothing could possibly go wrong, nothing of death or terror could reach. I spun around and threw up my hat and said, "You're going to make it after all!" more times than I care to admit! If you get there when the blossoms are beginning to fall, it feels like winter except instead of snowflakes caressing your face, it's the petals of a long ago promise of eternal peace and friendship between two countries. And I truly don't think one can ever really get tired of it, something cynical and bitter Washingtonians don't believe and are fond of saying to ANYBODY who will listen!
The phallic symbol to end all phallic symbols towering above innocence.
The Western title of the song is actually the name of a Japanese dish that has nothing to do with Sakamoto's lyrics of coping with loss through remembrance of happier times in the spring. The word was chosen over the original title by Western distributors for its far more marketable qualities in English speaking countries. This constant balancing of the creative with the commercial, the artistic with the profitable is where a lot of luxury brands and now fine artists find themselves. They are incessantly bombarded with the question, by agents, gallery owners and shareholders, of: "WILL THIS SELL?" LVMH's Louis Vuitton, under direction by Marc Jacobs, at once an originative entity and luxury products conglomerate, has met this challenge by collaborating with some of the most exciting and controversial names within the world of contemporary art and music. LVMH's partnerships with musicians have included those involving mogul-in-the-making Pharrell Williams, designing haute joallerie, and Kanye West, putting his ideas into a line of special edition shoes. But some of their most celebrated couplings are with high-profile artists like the late Stephen Sprouse, Richard Prince (my next post!) and, of course, Takashi Murakami, each artist rethinking and refashioning Louis Vuitton's image to fit their own unique vision. This heady mix of business, fashion, art, and music is proliferating and becoming more and more commonplace as the alleged walls between each is destroyed in chunks through each financial, if not always critical, success.
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Madison's top is peaking through the trees . . .
It's Murakami's vision for Louis Vuitton in 2003 that sent ripples through the world of fashion AND fine art. Here was what was and is, arguably, an artist with a questionable aesthetic turning Louis Vuitton's stalwart Monogram Canvas on its ear by adorning it with weird, cartoonish characters that look like they came from the recesses of Hunter S. Thompson's mind if he was five years old and attending a party hosted by Dr. Timothy Leary while watching Tina Turner perform "The Acid Queen" from The Who's Tommy! It's a hellacious universe based on what would appear to be the psychotropic whiling of Murakami and his Warhol-esque group of underling artists incorporated first under his Hiropon Factory, helping him create larger-than-life sculptures and paintings that seem completely devoid of having been touched by human hands at all. No brush strokes, no pencil lines; just daze inducing, retina searing, bright-colored acrylic paint on large canvases. His art, like the suppressed subculture it draws some inspiration from, has been dubbed "infantile" which may in fact be why the partnership with LVMH works so well, with the criticism leveled at Louis Vuitton of being one of "infantile" commercialism. Albeit, the synergy between Murakami and Vuitton cannot be denied since it has been so lucrative for both parties. Japan's, and perhaps the world's, love for objects that are kawai (Japanese for cute) and lust for things that confer status is fully explored within the confines of Murakami's and Vuitton's (unholy?) alliance.
Takashi Murakami: The Man
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Takashmi Murakami
As his own mother said, Takashi Murakami would not even have had the chance to cause this dialogue within the world of fashion or art if not for something as innocuous, but providential, as a large cloud over her home city of Kokura, Japan. The sky above Kokura being overcast meant that a B-29 carrying one of the most ungodly, horrific devices known to man had to deviate from it's intended first target of Kokura and focus instead on the second: Nagasaki. His parents impressed upon him the fact of his near non-existence quite a bit and may have coddled and sheltered him, and his siblings, very much because of it.
Murakami was encouraged to study art along with Japanese calligraphy, attending exhibits and writing papers on what he saw and learned for his parents. When not studying, he often went and practiced Buddhism a great deal. As he grew older, his teenage years were filled with more art studies whereas his free time was spent in the immersion of all things anime, planting the seeds of what would become the mighty tree of his catalogue raisonné. His lifelong study of art resulted in receiving a Ph.D from Tokyo National University, with a concentration in Nihonga which is a Japanese painting method that was more prevalent in the late 1800s. At this point, he was not yet doing the work his name has become most synonymous with, only doing anime as a lark. Well, all that changed in 1994.
After gaining recognition in Japan for his large, anime-style paintings, he became inspired to do more after seeing Jeff Koons' sensational sculpture of Michael Jackson in New York. Murakami, dubbed by many in the otaku scene as the "Ota-King," began working on the two pieces that catapulted him to, if not fame, at least notoriety: Hiropon , below, and My Lonesome Cowboy, which just sold this year for $15.6 million dollars. These fiberglass sculptures, and who and what they represent, are bound together, one hardly able to exist without the other.
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Hiporon
Before I delve into the accepted interpretation of these two watershed pieces, it must be noted that the otaku scene which is more often than not based upon an ardency most associated with obsession, the very one that spawned Takashi Murakami, is one with a varied and sometimes gruesome trope. The stereotype most commonly associated with this group is one of a person secluded in his or her home, socially and emotionally inept, fixated on cartons, comics, anime (some of it grotesquely sexual) and the paraphernalia attached to that, with some even dressing up as characters from these pieces of fiction in what is called kosupure, something Murakami has confessed to doing from time to time but not anymore. William Gibson, of cyberpunk fame, also humorously described this individual as a "pathological-techno-fetishist-with-social-deficit" and "the information age's embodiment of the connoisseur." While most are deemed "harmless" to others, if not themselves, there are some that are decidedly dangerous. In Japan at one point, otaku culture was extremely suppressed after Tsutomu Miyazaki, a cartoon addict with a collection of 6,000 anime and pornographic films, killed and dismembered little girls for pleasure. This gets into the sordid subject of the pervasive objectification and/or hyper-sexualization of women in media, and women in general, in many cultures and their subcultures that spawns these kinds of people, which is a whole 'nother kettle of fish!
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My Lonesome Cowboy
Murakami after creating Hiropon, under the influence of Toshio Okada of Neon Genesis Evangelion fame, created My Lonesome Cowboy. While Hiropon is a typical otaku fan's wet dream, My Lonesome Cowboy IS that very same fan! They invariably end up playing with just themselves, is one thing that Murakami says is most accurate about many otaku, with those who have men or women (often otaku themeselves) in their lives out of social obligation. Although Hiropon is spewing white liquid, that could or could not be milk, from her disturbingly large breasts with which to jump rope, My Lonesome Cowboy is taking his purple mountain majesty in hand and expelling a white liquid into a sort of lasso shape. Both pieces have facial expressions and eyes that are filled with a disconcerting happiness blended with vacancy, spiritual and otherwise. The otaku subculture shaped his work and while he is grateful, he is also highly critical of the types of people it harbors and this split is present in many of his other works. The new name of his fledgling business that started as Hiropon Factory ("hiropon" is the slang term for crystal methamphetamine) is now KaiKai Kiki Co. (which sounds oddly like the snickering of a schoolgirl), may be signaling an idealogical schism within the man himself; "kaikai" and "kiki" are roughly translated into good and evil. Maybe he is saying that the subculture is both "good" and "evil." Maybe he is saying commercial success itself is both "good" and "evil." Most times with artists, everything has a dual meaning or subtext and I think the name change and reorganization of his company is no exception.
Takashi Murakami: The Art
727-727: A mix of several styles and materials, showing definite progression on Murakami's part. Mr. D.O.B., the character's name, rides a wave.
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I open wide my eyes but see no scenery. I fix my gaze upon my heart: This piece, a major departure from everything above, depicts Darum, the Indian monk who introduced Buddhism to China. It is an ink painting on gold, silver and titanium!
The Japan of the very recent past, unless we are speaking of kimono, was awash in minimalism, especially post-war. The Japanese "look" is often classified as "minimal," with clean lines, little ornamentation and subdued colors. This was not always suggestive of how it always was or how it even is now. What we find now within Japan and certain areas of fashion, was eagerly reported in Esquire's interview of Takashi Murakami: maximalism. If we were to use space as the setting for comparison, Japanese design and art of yore is like George Lucas' THX 1138 but, as Murakami himself says, his world owes more to George "P-Funk" Clinton's Parliament-Funkadelic version of the future than anything else. What does that mean? Max design; max scope; max detail; max color; these are all hallmarks of Murakami's work and his bond with Louis Vuitton, which is over-saturation of the client in both art and luxury. Taking a company's current products, whose early conceptions already owed much to Japan itself, and molding them to reflect the tastes of a distinct sub-segment of Japanese society occupied by lonely otaku boys and ebullient Harajuku girls, both stuck in a childish world of their own creation a la The 40 Year-Old Virgin, is bold enough as it is before you mix in the conditional approval of the fashionista and fashionisto. However, Murakami can be seen as the "geek who made good," whose auspicious timing caused the worlds of all three to collide to form a new ****** where at least one planet's inhabitants come out looking FABULOUS.
My personal thoughts on Murakami are not immediately favorable or unfavorable, which is not to say it's apathy because it's not; but my thoughts on the anime genre is one of ambivalence and my feelings on the otaku movement is one of distaste; they're just not my thing. And I do get aspects of it because I have an affinity for geeks. However, with that in mind, his art and the movement in art he represents, while not a favorite of mine, does have some kind of place within our culture. Murakami believes that pop culture and otaku, or "Poku" as he termed it, is fusing together, with otaku becoming more acceptable to the mainstream, in art, fashion and even music. In regards to his work with Louis Vuitton, I really do love the injection of capriciousness that all the strange figures and psychedelic colors imparts to an otherwise staid brand but I don't believe it's an easy or even a long-term relationship. It's more of an on again, off again dalliance which, like the spring, comes and goes.
To that extent, with Murakami as artist, I feel, as Peter Schjeldahl stated, he hasn't seduced me so much as dazzled me with preternatural creatures and dreamscapes/nightmares. Art, as mentioned, has an obligation and a duty to seduce the viewer; it should tantalize the viewer with thoughts of another place in which you would perhaps wish to journey for a short time, staying longer if the mood suits you. If the art neither enrages you nor rouses your higher imagination, has it really done it's job? I'm certain with the right amount of LSD or 'shrooms, knowledge of Adobe Illustrator and a printer that I could produce works of similar depth (because there is NO WAY all his art pieces were created in sobriety; his company was named after crystal, for god's sake)! And that's not always a good feeling to come away with when viewing "fine art." I will say this for Murakami, suitably, his art works better when in motion than still, and the videos I watched of his short films when I was at an LV boutique confirm this fact.
Here's the video in question which depicts a little girl lost inside one of Murakami's creations after it eats her cell phone and then swallows her; once inside, the world of Louis Vuitton is all around her and she has a tiny spirit guide flower thingie which helps her get her phone back:<object width="425" height="344">
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The song playing throughout the video is Fantastic Plastic Machine's Different Colors which is apropos. The real store (which has the animations superimposed on it) is the Omotesando in Tokyo, Japan, one of Louis Vuitton's most profitable stores.
Art is subjective so I'm not condemning or endorsing Murakami. You can the judge the virtue of breast milk jump ropes all on your own. If you like anime or were a child of the 60s, drop a hit and visit one of his exhibitions; you'll thank or kill me later.
Takashi Murakami: The Product
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Art (Taka**** Murakami), Music (Kanye West) & Fashion (Marc Jacobs): I'm not sure I would consider this the First Triumvirate of its kind, but it's certainly one of the most well-known and most successful. Pin stripes, polka dots and a striped bow tie? FOR REAL? With fashion help RIGHT there? LOL
We may all well be able to deliberate indefinitely on the merits of Murakami as artist, but I think the jury has come back with a verdict on Murakami as marketer. He's guilty of turning what is widely believed by many to be simple cartoon illustrations into bona fide expensive, major gallery-represented fine art. But just as some of his works have achieved high prestige, he's not far from the low with his sculptures miniaturized and sold with candy in convenience stores, made into statuettes for consumption by the people who visit his exhibitions or the local comic book shop. Marc Jacobs, without a doubt the biggest nerd of the fashion world and closet anime fan, helped to keep Murakami on the minds and thoughts of everyone through their first historic confederation. And with Louis Vuitton vouching for the unusual little artist to the self-proclaimed "Louis Vuitton Don" Kanye West, he enlisted Murakami to give his album and single covers with that smattering of trademark schmaltz for which he is rapidly becoming known, turning The Don into a doe-eyed bear. I hear the Grateful Dead bears and Teddy Ruxpin want to kick his @ss. Gwen Stefani's a little miffed too; after all, she made Asian's great.
Mercedes-Benz, a company I admire, is also one of the companies digging for gold in the Murakami mines by using his appeal and rock star status in Japan to launch and promote their automobiles. The good thing about thing about this is they used the happy flowers instead Tan tan Bo, which I am enthusiastic about.
2008 Mercedes-Benz C-Class Sport
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2008 Mercedes-Benz C-Class Sport
These bags below mark Louis Vuitton's and Takashi Murakami's latest brainchild for 2008, mixing the shockingly guerrilla camouflage pattern with black LVs, flowers and quatrefoils to fight the day-to-day battles that is part and parcel of The Urban War. The Monogramouflage pattern was inspired by Murakami's latest work, Magic Ball, but the Neverfull pieces harken back to his first project with Louis Vuitton in tone and color. I would love to recommend the replica bags done under their last collaboration, but they are exceedingly difficult to find and harder to find in the high quality form that most handbag collector's require. To remind those of you who cannot recall what he last produced with them, let me offer up this bit of nostalgia:
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I can recall the feeling I got when seeing the cherry blossoms in bloom in Washington for the first time; a feeling of awe and joy that is COMPLETELY mirrored on one of my favorite creations of Louis Vuitton: the Cherry Blossom Papillon. The smiling faces of the blossoms dotting the Monogram Canvas really invigorated me! Who can be sad if they're carrying a Louis Vuitton bag with happy flowers and a bow on it?! This is the perfect bag for a spring or summer day, without question. I didn't think I had any of that little Japanese schoolgirl tolerance for sap in me until I saw this bag (and I say that having proudly owned three Tamagotchis at once in my early teens). Damn, Murakami! Kamikaze right to my heart. It rekindled all those memories of bygone springs, winsome and wistful. *sigh*
©Murakami Special Edition Museum of Contemporary Art Monogram Canavas Neverfull (A mouthfull! All sizes):
The Neverfull is a VERY popular open tote that has become a must-have for many Louis Vuitton and classic handbag collectors. This particular model was designed by Murakami for his exhibitions ONLY. If you didn't go, you couldn't pick one up from an LV boutique or calling Louis Vuitton client services; but Ebay made it possible for you to pretend you went and bought it there, schmoozing with captains of industry, socialites and high-class wh*res. The genuine bag typically sells for a nearly 50% premium over it's retail cost when it was at the museum now. I do like this bag by itself and don't really mind the quirky, Murakami-style LV. It's more subdued for him considering his past and easier for me to stomach, that's for sure. My Bitter 1990s Cynicism is really no match for the Sunshine 1960s Optimism of the smiling flower at the top of the 'V.' I can already feel my angst draining at the rays of delight coming from that little daisy.
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Now, it is interesting to note that this bag above is very well-printed with colors that while not as intense as the hues of the genuine, are very good. This bag was obviously not made by the same machine as the PM model below. The machine that printed this bag must be the one in the factory with the drinking problem. The hardware, dimensions and tags are all ridiculously precise but the stylized 'LV's' colors are outside the lines, like a child's kindergarten picture without any of the earnestness. I strongly advise shopping between sites and comparing their bags because this model's quality, for all it's simplicity, is really all over the place. Anyone who says they got a second-rate bag from a site with photos as specific as these should just never buy online because the GREAT sites take pictures of everything that would give the bag away as a fake, something totally absent at many sellers. You need to be able to see these things BEFORE you buy a bag from anyone. Let me say, for the benefits of our members in the Asian markets that this bag will NOT work for you as this fatal flaw would cause you a tremendous amount of grief socially.
PM's LV:
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The reason I mention this, for uninitiated, is because in certain places in Asia, carrying replica bag is heavily discouraged and basically frowned upon. They take their luxury goods very seriously there. And let's just pretend that you were to carry a replica bag in, say, Singapore and be discovered; from that point forward, you may as well continue buying replicas of everything because no one will believe that anything you wear or carry is genuine again, even if it is. It's a contact sport there, that's for sure. I believe most other people living elsewhere can carry these with a little less concern of becoming a fashion pariah.
Monogramouflage Limited Edition Keepall 55:
If for whatever reason all the other fabrics, patterns and skins that Louis Vuitton offers their travel products in didn't quite conform to your tastes because they were either too conservative or not "combat ready," then this particular piece should fit those criteria very well. While I would never carry it because I dislike camo, I'm sure that for most men and women (but mostly men) this is a fun choice, especially those who want to be reminded of their military status when they're off-duty (but fashionably, or course). For a while, I didn't know what to make of this pattern; I thought it was, at best, a lazy application of Murakami's talents, considering what he's created for the brand in the past. Wow, camouflage. How enchantingly 1992. I did not want to like the Monogramouflage BUT I can readily understand its allure for some people. The line comes in scarves, iPhone cases, passport covers and wallets, among other things. I now think it's a great choice for someone in the military who wouldn't ordinarily consider Louis Vuitton at all. It's got a guerrilla advertising presence that's very ironic. And maybe it's saying everything's fair in luggage and war. I don't know.
For all that, it's pretty much a standard Keepall with extra detailing that characterizes it from said standard Keepall, if the camo pattern didn't clue anyone in right away. The genuine version is $2,000, making this a fantastic choice.
Side:
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Tag:
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Monogramouflage Limited Edition Speedy 35:
For the ladies who don't mind Mono and camo, then this is all you. Louis Vuitton offers a Monogramouflage piece in Denim called the Lys, but I prefer the perennially perfect pick, Speedy! Even though this bag, when loaded with only one or two heavy items, sags on the bottom I still love it. I have two Speedys in Damier Azur and Damier and am tempted to get one of these simply because it is a Speedy but I'm sure I have nothing I could wear it with. Although, this would give me the perfect excuse to go shopping, like I need one anyway.
Side:
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There's a lot of interest on this board about the iPhone so I decided to place it in the list. The real version of this case costs as much as the phone itself. I believe this replica has better value-to-function-to-price-of-item-it-will-be-holding ratio. I like this little case better than Louis Vuitton's other holders. I'm not exactly sure why. I think it may be because this makes a great off day case instead of something like their Taiga case. Yeah, I think that's why. Everything has a time and place.
Multicolore Monogram Canvas Keepall 45 (Black, White):
Japan has meant so much to Louis Vuitton's profits that Murakami leaving a significant mark upon them is only right, with the Multicolore bags that came out during 2003 having become a regular part of Louis Vuitton's product line. The pieces I selected below are good bags to take into the fall which is why I have not included other well-replicated bags like the limited edition Marilyn.
Side:
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This is where it all began. I decided to end on this piece because it's classic, in that Keepall way, and it has a lot of functions for such a simple form. The Keepall 45 is the smallest travel bag in the Keepall lineup, coming in white Multicolore as well. It has very compact dimensions that make it the perfect carry-on bag but is roomy enough to hold toiletries and clothes and a pair of shoes, with extra pockets not found on other Keepalls. Kanye West carries this sometimes when he travels and swears by all his Keepalls. But lately, I've seen this bag being carried as an everyday piece, making the smallest Keepall travel bag the biggest handbag, ginormous handbags being very chic right now. This bag is still smaller than the Mahina XXL which is why I don't mind mentioning its use as an everday handbag; Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton both use one as a purse. I'm not dead set against it, per se.
Inside:
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But this brings me to a point, ladies and gentlemen. This would make a perfect, as my friend would call it, H.O.B. (Ho Overnight Bag). A ho overnight bag is the bag you carry with extra clothes, toothbrush and deodorant for those times when you may not be home right away, which totally explains why both Kardashian and Hilton carry one. Their bags probably contain a bottle of RU-486, a Rolex, sunglasses, crystal meth and a rayon/lycra jersey dress so wrinkles won't be an issue. There's one thing I KNOW they DON'T keep in there: panties.
No matter how you feel about Takashi Murami, the man, the art or the product, he's an indelible part of the pop culture landscape. Will he have as big an impact as Andy Warhol, who it seems he's fashioning himself after? No, I really don't think so but I'm sure he thinks so. And I'm more than sure that if Louis Vuitton would have had Marc Jacobs with them in the 1980s, they'd have asked him to get Warhol involved in their product lines anyway. As it stands, if they run out of contemporary artists avant garde enough for them, they'll probably raise him the way Ford reanimated Steve McQueen.
Questions, comments, criticism, epiphanies and love letters are always welcome! Thanks for reading.
