Ebay Auction A few weeks ago I went to the Takashi Murakami exhibit at the MOCO (Museum of Contemporary Art) at the Geffen. This was the first confusing part as it wasn't AT the MOCA - it was at this wing of the MOCA behind the Japanese museum. My friend and I were going on a mission because she'd been asked by a New York friend to pick up one of these Louis Vuitton purses. Neither one of us are "Purse" or "Fashion" people so we didn't really know what the big deal was - we were going for the art! But while there we decided to pick up a second purse (since they are one per customer and there were two of us). The original purse got shipped off to her friend in New York and we decided to eBay the second one.
Beyond the Louis Vuitton store there were quite a few interesting Murakami pieces - my favorite was the animation pieces. There was a great one featuring his characters KaiKai and KiKi (sp?) involving watermelon seeds and poop. Any kid comedy featuring poop is just instantly classic I believe! :) There were also a lot of pieces just generally featuring bodily functions like happy little mutant erections ("My Body is Alive!") and lactation and semen sprays... happily spraying. (Thankfully not live.) All in all - there is just nothing quite like modern Japanese art.
Here's a little something Takashi did for Louis Vuitton (beyond the purse) that features some of that purse art :
Example of KaiKai and KiKi animation:
And here's a specific tour of the exhibition:
