Yoshitomo Nara: Shallow Puddles

Catalogue of the artist’s eighth solo show with Blum & Poe and his first at the Tokyo space, featuring an English-Japanese bilingual essay by Shigemi Takahashi, curator at Aomori Museum of Art, who has worked closely with the artist on numerous projects. Filled with full-color, detailed images of the artist's Shallow Puddles series works. These paintings are executed on shallow circular dishes, covered with small square patches of canvas, and seemingly create portals to a world inundated with water. Depicted on each is a solitary figure that, like those in many of the artist’s iconic paintings, holds the viewer’s gaze with its large, full eyes, some even with averted eyes. Ground and figure are the main components of each work, yet the artist’s painterly execution calls attention to his manipulation of color, form, and composition to create an image that transcends traditional portraiture.