Neo-pop (also known as new pop) is a postmodern art movement that surged in the 1980s and 1990s. It is a resurgent, evolved, and modern version of the ideas of pop art artists from the 50s, capturing some of its commercial ideas and kitsch aspects. However, unlike in pop art, Neo-pop takes inspiration from a wider amount of sources and techniques. [1]
Neo-pop art's visuals don't retain many aspects of traditional pop art but rather convey its ideas into modern times. Neo-pop takes elements from pop art like its emphasis on popular culture, consumerism, and mass media and its bright color palette. The visuals are mainly rooted in vibrant colors, diverse patterns (like polka dots, flowers, hearts, stars, lines, etc.), and a mix of imagery from everyday life, like advertisements and pop culture. Neo-pop artists often took inspiration from celebrities, cartoons, and iconic trademarks to make their artworks. Defined as a resurgence of the aesthetics and ideas from the mid-20th century movement capturing the characteristics of pop art like intentional kitsch and interest in commercialism. [2]
The term (which was originated in 1992 by Japanese critic Noi Sawaragi) [3] refers to artists influenced by pop art and popular culture imagery, such as Jeff Koons, Romero Britto, Damien Hirst, Peter Mars and Ismail Ferraj, but also artists working in graffiti and cartoon art, such as Keith Haring and Kenny Scharf. [4] [5]
Japanese artist Takashi Murakami is described as the first of the Japanese neo-pop artists to "break the ice in terms of recycling Japanese pop culture". [6] Japanese neo-pop known as Superflat is associated with the otaku subculture and the obsessive interests in anime, manga and other forms of pop culture. Artist Kenji Yanobe exemplifies this approach to art and fandom. [7]
Ismail Ferraj, a contemporary neo pop artist from Albania is also known as the first artist who is currently making innovations in culture and art in his country, his work is represented by vivid, bright colors and the characteristic line, with images brought from popular culture such as the white anime glove, with various works such as "Maybe", "Inside Her", "Llapelle", "Plastiko" , "Untitled", etc.
Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the United Kingdom and the United States during the mid- to late-1950s. The movement presented a challenge to traditions of fine art by including imagery from popular and mass culture, such as advertising, comic books and mundane mass-produced objects. One of its aims is to use images of popular culture in art, emphasizing the banal or kitschy elements of any culture, most often through the use of irony. It is also associated with the artists' use of mechanical means of reproduction or rendering techniques. In pop art, material is sometimes visually removed from its known context, isolated, or combined with unrelated material.
Postmodern art is a body of art movements that sought to contradict some aspects of modernism or some aspects that emerged or developed in its aftermath. In general, movements such as intermedia, installation art, conceptual art and multimedia, particularly involving video are described as postmodern.
The history of anime can be traced back to the start of the 20th century, with the earliest verifiable films dating from 1917. Before the advent of film, Japan already had a rich tradition of entertainment with colourful painted figures moving across the projection screen in utsushi-e (写し絵), a particular Japanese type of magic lantern show popular in the 19th century. Possibly inspired by European phantasmagoria shows, utsushi-e showmen used mechanical slides and developed lightweight wooden projectors (furo) that were handheld so that several performers could each control the motions of different projected figures.
Neo-expressionism is a style of late modernist or early-postmodern painting and sculpture that emerged in the late 1970s.. Neo-expressionists were sometimes called Transavantgarde, Junge Wilde or Neue Wilden. It is characterized by intense subjectivity and rough handling of materials.
Superflat is a postmodern art movement, founded by the artist Takashi Murakami, which is influenced by manga and anime. However, superflat does not have an explicit definition because Takashi Murakami does not want to limit the movement, but rather leave room for it to grow and evolve over time.
Takashi Murakami is a Japanese contemporary artist. He works in fine arts as well as commercial media and is known for blurring the line between high and low arts. His influential work draws from the aesthetic characteristics of the Japanese artistic tradition and the nature of postwar Japanese culture. He designed the album covers for Kanye West's third studio album Graduation and West and Kid Cudi’s collaborative studio album Kids See Ghosts.
Aya Takano is a Japanese painter, Superflat artist, manga artist, and science fiction essayist. Aya Takano is represented by Kaikai Kiki, the artistic production studio created in 2001 by Takashi Murakami.
Chiho Aoshima is a Japanese pop artist and member of Takashi Murakami's Kaikai Kiki Collective. Aoshima graduated from the Department of Economics, Hosei University, Tokyo. She held a residency at Art Pace, San Antonio, United States in 2006.
Twentieth-century art—and what it became as modern art—began with modernism in the late nineteenth century.
Little Boy: The Arts of Japan's Exploding Subculture is the companion catalogue to the exhibition "Little Boy" curated by artist Takashi Murakami. The book is about the aesthetics of postwar culture in Japan and marks the final project of Murakami's Superflat Trilogy started in 2000.
Mr. is a Japanese contemporary artist, based in Saitama Prefecture, Japan. A former protégé of Takashi Murakami, Mr.'s work debuted in both solo and group exhibitions in 1996, and has since been seen in museum and gallery exhibitions in Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Hong Kong, Seoul, Daegu, Paris, New York, Minneapolis, Chicago, Miami, Jerusalem, Los Angeles, and London.
Superstroke is a term used for a contemporary art movement with its origins in South Africa. Superstroke is one of the influential art movements regarding African modernism and abstraction. The word "Superstroke" implies the super expressive brush stroke. The Superstroke art movement was initially founded as a reaction to the impact that the Superflat art movement, founded by Takashi Murakami had on modern contemporary art.
SoFlo Superflat describes an art genre started in Miami in the 1990s. It is an urban pop art movement in South Florida that combines super bright colors and ultra flat images. The subject matters are very diverse. It is an outcrop of the Japanese Superflat movement, founded by the artist Takashi Murakami.
Erina Matsui is a Japanese contemporary artist. She is known for her surreal self-portraits, mostly done as oil paintings. Her work has been praised for its jarring visual impact as it defies normal representations of childhood being cute and innocent.
Fantasista Utamaro is a Japanese artist, art director, illustrator, and graphic designer based in Brooklyn, New York. He is considered to be one of the leading artists working in the Japanese pop art movement, whose work explores the concepts of celebration, culture, freedom, and unlimited possibilities through a pop culture lens.
Hiro Ando is a Japanese contemporary multi-disciplinary artist who fuses ancient and modern Japanese traditional themes into his contemporary plastic pop-art sculptures.
My Lonesome Cowboy is a sculpture created in 1998 by Japanese artist Takashi Murakami. Produced during Murakami's so-called "bodily fluids" period, the 9.45 ft-tall (288 cm) statue depicts an anime-inspired figure ejaculating a large strand of semen. Like its companion piece Hiropon, My Lonesome Cowboy is an example of superflat art, an art movement founded by Murakami in the 1990s to criticize Japanese consumer culture. The sculpture is noted as among Murakami's most famous works.
Hiropon is a sculpture created in 1997 by Japanese artist Takashi Murakami. Produced during Murakami's so-called "bodily fluids" period, the 7.33 ft tall statue depicts an anime-inspired figure expelling streams of breast milk from her nipples. Like its companion piece My Lonesome Cowboy, it is an example of superflat art, an art movement founded by Murakami in the 1990s to criticize Japanese consumer culture.
The Dropout Bear, also referred to as the Kanye Bear or the Graduation Bear, is an anthropomorphic symbol, character, and mascot for American rapper Kanye West. The bear was originally designed by graphic designer Sam Hansen, and was used in the album cover art, promotion, and music videos for West's first three studio albums, The College Dropout (2004), Late Registration (2005), and Graduation (2007).
Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise, the 1987 debut work of Gainax written and directed by Hiroyuki Yamaga, has attracted academic analysis of its themes in various formats, including dissertations, scholarly journals, university press books, and installations.