Takashi Murakami Will Open a Major Exhibition of New Works at Gagosian Gallery in November

Takashi Murakami attempts to "make sense" of nature's chaos with this new body of work.

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Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

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Contemporary Japanese artist Takashi Murakami will bless New York next month with an exhibition of new paintings and sculptures at Gagosian Gallery. Titled "In the Land of the Dead, Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow," the exhibition will open at the gallery's West 24th Street space in on Nov. 10 and run through Jan. 17. 2015.

As with his recent exhibition at Milan's Palazzo Reale and his other pieces produced after the 2011 Fukushima disaster, the art in "In the Land of the Dead, Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow" was created as a result of Murakami's exploration of Japanese art made following historic natural disasters. The artist combines modern and classical techniques in his work, and also blends religious symbols with sci-fi and manga imagery.

"Here is a contemporary belief system, constructed in the wake of disaster, that merges earlier faiths, myths, and images into a syncretic spirituality of the artist’s imagination," reads the press release for the exhibition. "Murakami investigates the role of faith amid the inexorable transience and trauma of existence."

In a quote from the artist, he shares his thoughts on the intersection of religion and nature: "To me, religions are a narrative...Natural catastrophes, earthquakes, are things caused by nature. Such chaos is natural, but we have to make sense of it somehow, and so we had to invent these stories. That is what I wanted to paint."

For more info on the exhibition, head to Gagosian Gallery's website.

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