I'll be looking forward to January just in case! ;-D
Because if we delve deep enough into some of his punctual reasonings we discover only
Kanada's fire dragons represent true art evolution for their nation since the
Hokusai paintings, and that doesn't "paint" a complete picture of his overall opinion either.
Maybe
Hiroki Azuma was right all along and
Mr. Murakami's primary intentions were to show with his 'hybrid art' a revenge towards that Americanization through 'pop' culture of the 1st 'otaku' wave coming from the post-WWII baby boomer generation, which pushed them towards a self-caricatured expressionism in search of a twisted identity they could truly call their own. But even taking into account that,
Mr. Murakami apparently never personally resented such influence in the end, admitting he is as well a product of those times while also conforming to the present market bottom-line requests, appealing to that market instead of blatantly pursuing a critique of their consumerism as you mention... using parody to highlight clearly defining traits of the 'ota' culture, yeah that's true, but also admitting he is just presenting the culture as such without wanting any added scorn from his part. During his collaborations with
KAIYODO &
BOME he commented as much, in contrast to the scepticism of the sculptor.
Anyway, whatever opportunity it takes to enjoy work from people like
Hiromasa Ogura (
the Proto Anime Cut exhibition was like a revelation to me of how accomplished his designs can be, such detail is to be enjoyed better at the close distances) is a good one. I think ulterior motives should never stop us from trying to enjoy many different individual aspects of any project.
