SUPERFLAT EXHIBITION
Art for the here and now
It was at an art world dinner in Tokyo last November that the idea for Juxtapoz x Superflat was hatched.
Among those present was Takashi Murakami, a superstar on the international contemporary art scene who, in addition to being one of Japan’s leading artists, also collects and writes about art; and Evan Pricco, editor-in-chief of the trendsetting Juxtapoz Art & Culture magazine in San Francisco.
Also present was James Jean, whose work Murakami was showing in his gallery. And who’s that you might ask? In the traditional, institutional world of art, James Jean isn’t what you’d call a name on the tongue of critical theorists, but he’s a big deal in popular culture. He’s created numerous covers for DC Comics, received scads of awards for his illustrations, worked for clients such as Atlantic Records and Prada and — here’s a telling detail — has 556,000 followers on Instagram.
Despite all the accolades and the fact that shows of his prints and paintings regularly sell out, Jean felt something was missing, Pricco said.
“He was telling Takahashi and I that for all the successes, all the fans who follow him, he was never going to get critical attention,” Pricco said.
He felt his lack of official recognition by critics and curators was epitomized by never being taken seriously enough, for example, to get a review in Art Forum, one of the sacred texts in the world of high art.
Jean’s lack of recognition, both Pricco and Murakami felt, was a sign of a disconnect in the art world.
So they conceived of an art exhibition that presented an up-tothe-minute snapshot of contemporary art. It’s not a retrospective, as Pricco said in an interview, that looks back at what has already been anointed as art. It’s an exhibition of art-on-the run.
“Takashi and I said: ‘ Now is the time.’ We don’t want to wait. We don’t want to be talking backwards. We want now, the now.”
The exhibition illustrates Murakami’s idea of “superflat” in art. It’s a concept with multiple meanings, including the flattening of traditional hierarchies between high and low art.
“The idea that Takashi and I had was this: ‘Let’s take blue chip, let’s take low brow, let’s take street art and bring all of it together,” Pricco said.
“It doesn’t need to have some sort of lineage or historical precedent. It just needs to be what is happening now.”
Its first iteration was this past August as a pop-up exhibition for four days during the Seattle Art Fair. At the Vancouver Art Gallery, Juxtapoz x Superflat has been expanded to 36 artists from around the world. They’re from a variety of backgrounds including skateboarding, graffiti, comics, design and traditional arts.
The exhibition is a mess — and I mean that in a good way. It’s a little like looking at a mash-up of visual culture from someone’s afternoon cruising around the Internet. Many works are about the body and the different pressures and stresses it’s under in a digital world. One cheeky work by a Brooklyn artist, for example, turns a paused animated sex scene into a hand-woven tapestry.
Colour is everywhere. Many works rely on a knowledge of popular culture. Some are incredibly juvenile and crude (does Big Bird have to swear?) and some, very smart and perceptive (a life-size copy of Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei lying face down is fabulous). It’s an exhibition of dynamic energy as opposed to relaxing contemplation.
In a generation or a century from now, will the works on the second floor of the VAG be considered examples of great art from the beginning of the 21st century? Who knows? But it is art of today — or at least of the last few years — that has met the threshold of being noticed by people who make it their business to recognize what’s new: Murakami and Pricco.
“I want the show to kind of remind people that art is created to make people feel good, to think, to understand the culture around them,” Pricco said.
“This show is supposed to be challenging and fun, but also a way to get those institutional challenges out of the way and let (people) know that they can like art without knowing a ton about it.”