Yoshitomo Nara
Born: 1959
Hometown: Hirosaki, Japan
Lives and Works: Tokyo, Japan
Education:
Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Germany
MFA, Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music, Nagakute, Japan
BFA, Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music, Nagakute, Japan
Yoshitomo Nara Bio
About The Artist
Japanese artist Yoshimoto Nara is one of the most influential artists to emerge from Japan's Pop art movement in the 1990s. Drawing inspiration from the anime and manga characters that he was exposed to during his childhood, Nara creates characters, usually small children, who possess similar cartoonish qualities, with highly stylized features and especially large eyes. However, Nara's illustrations of children, who are often brandishing weapons, are often more menacing and devilish than they are cute and innocent.
Nara has assembled a cult-like following centered around his child-like illustrations—however the themes surrounding his work touch on broader social and cultural topics, such as violence and the rigidity of social structures in Japan. Though he works mainly in painting and drawing, he also experiments in sculpture and installations.
Since his first solo exhibition at Blum and Poe Gallery in 1984, Nara has had nearly 40 solo exhibitions worldwide, from Iceland to Japan to France to the United States.
Yoshitomo Nara Gallery Art
Galleries
Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, England
Blum and Poe, Los Angeles, CA
Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo and Kyoto, Japan
Galerie Zink, Munich, Germany
Yoshitomo Nara Permanent Collections
Select Permanent Collections
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA
Neues Museum für Kunst und Design, Nuremberg, Germany
The Tokushima Modern Art Museum, Japan
Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL
Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY
Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo
Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, Japan
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA
Centro de Arte Contemporaneo de Malaga, Spain
Yoshitomo Nara Art
Works by the Artist
