Yoshitomo Nara

Yoshitomo Nara
Nara at the Yokohama Art Museum, 2012
Born (1959-12-05) 5 December 1959 (age 64)
NationalityJapanese
Alma materKunstakademie Düsseldorf, Germany
Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music, Nagakute Aichi, Japan
Known forsculpture, painting
Notable workKnife Behind Back (2000), Sorry, couldn't draw left eye! (2003),
Straight Jacket (2000),
Sprout the Ambassador (2001)[1]
AwardsAward for Artist, Nagoya, Japan, 1995

Yoshitomo Nara (奈良 美智, Nara Yoshitomo, born 5 December 1959 in Hirosaki, Aomori Prefecture, Japan) is a Japanese artist. He lives and works in Nasushiobara, Tochigi Prefecture, though his artwork has been exhibited worldwide. Nara has had nearly 40 solo exhibitions since 1984.[2] His art work has been housed at the MoMA and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). His most well-known and repeated subjects are "big-headed girls" with piercing eyes, who one Nara scholar describes as having "childlike expressions [that] resonate with adult emotions, [their] embodiment of kawaii (cuteness) carries a dark humor, and any explicit cultural references are intertwined with personal memories."[3][4]

  1. ^ Holzwarth, Hans W. (2009). 100 Contemporary Artists A-Z (Taschen's 25th anniversary special ed.). Köln: Taschen. pp. 410–412. ISBN 978-3-8365-1490-3.
  2. ^ "San Jose Museum of Art". 2009-12-23. Archived from the original on 2014-02-02. Retrieved 28 January 2014.
  3. ^ Koon, Yeewan (2020). Yoshitomo Nara. Phaidon. p. 6. Archived from the original on 2022-06-18. Retrieved 2022-08-03.
  4. ^ Koon, Yeewan (2016). "The Artist Behind the Camera: Yoshitomo Nara". Once in a Life – Encounters with Nara. Asia Society. Retrieved 7 January 2020.