Ball of Fun. Got the summer blues? Kick that feeling with the summer yellows, greens, pinks and purples.
Takashi Murakami's shockingly colorful exhibition, "The Octopus Eats His Own Leg," is now on display at The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth. The quirky title is a common Japanese expression - an octopus in distress can chew off a damaged leg for survival, and a new one will grow in its place. Murakami thinks of himself as an octopus of sorts, feeding off of his own prior artwork to create new art. The superstar artist has reached mainstream acclaim, thanks to collaborations with Kanye West (a piece titled "Kanye Bear" is also on display at The Modern), Louis Vuitton and Pharrell Williams.
Strongly influenced by pop culture and anime, the Japanese artist uses a style he calls "superflat," pairing traditional Japanese painting techniques with a contemporary aesthetic within a flattened picture plane. The exhibition, organized by the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, is a major retrospective of his paintings, featuring 50 works that span three decades of his career.
"The Octopus Eats His Own Leg" is on display through Sept. 16.
