OKAMOTO Mitsuhiro
Makkuro Pop
October 25 - November 22, 2014

For immediate release

eitoeiko is pleased to announce a solo exhibition ‘Makkuro Pop’ by OKAMOTO Mitsuhiro(b.1968).
The exhibition is curated by Takeshi Kudo, a curator of Aomori Museum of Art. Makkuro means
entirely black in Japanese. The word is also used with the meaning of the worst, and the baddest.
Excerpt from the text by the curator:
In that sense, The work of OKAMOTO Mitsuhiro is opposedto the time which is characterized as the present. It is not
an honest, it has not a weight. It rather makes a fool of aviewer, or it seems to be being ridiculous. This is why hiswork is underestimated in the art scene. Making a value is,in the other words, being recognized by an authority. And
his activities are based on doubting it. OKAMOTO is an artist
thoroughly distrusts about a right, a power and a public
opinion called a common sense.
OKAMOTO’s attitude to making his art is consistent. He
directly throws a question in a society. The question isformed by his own experience, his thoughts and recognitionof the world as an Kyotojin (Japanese who was born andlives in Kyoto). And not to be committed to the others and asociety, it is always crystallized with his personal filters inhis brain. The process is strictly executed in the overseas,so sometimes OKAMOTO made the work which the people
on the spot could never understand it. This attempt isconsidered as a perfect relativization. From his work, wecan find out the relativization of ‘I’ and ‘You’, Japan and theST#328 Poli-bukuro/ Recycle Kills The Copyright 2world, the present and the past, and the front and the back2014, stuffed toy(Pipo-kun), snap lockof the subject. The question has no correct answer. The
artist just indicates the gap of the meaning and the recognition which is occurred by therelativization.
In recent years, OKAMOTO is known for his work about the problem of the copyright that does notprotect a culture but uses for aconcession. It suggests thesituation like that culture
dwarfing culture. Hence thereconstruction of a motif in asociety is his body of the work
even if the meanings werearranged, or were thrown awayin the chaos. The gap by therelativization causes various
feelings such as the surprise,laughter and the anger. And
there is a something newviewpoint in his work. The mostimportant thing for tasting
OKAMOTO’s work deeply isthinking about where the various
ST#329 JMP8-3
feelings come from. Today
2014, silkscreen on canvas, 1240×690×40mm

parody and irony are not permitted, and also humor
and wit are not recognized as effective means of thecritics. The work of OKAMOTO reminds us thepleasure of thought which is given from anintellectual play as well as the visual pleasure to open
the mind from a closed society.
That is not a bland-new way. It continues fromancient. For example, a tragedy can transform into acomedy. It is easy to point out that is imprudent, but
it is a fact that there is a person those who consumes
a tragedy for his or her own feeling of satisfaction.
R#230 mpc Shinagawa 301 Ho 1305
Truth is not one thing, it changes easily by
2014, 1/18 Benz, LED systeminterpretation. Even one human being can have a lotof feelings, so it is impossible to understand a whole society, which is accumulating a mass of theunconscious minds. When it was interpreted, the different interpretation will be brought soon. I
rather say the work of OKAMOTO indicates the world is still multilayered of the meanings, as
though it seems that the world today advances homogenized, at least the surface of it. From hiswork, viewers can think about how to take care of the world.
Culture is an accumulating body of the intellect, and it is a complicated textile of the quotation. It
generates both of the feelings and its meanings limitlessly. It is easy to make a beautiful thing by
the surface of it. OKAMOTO does not want such a pure white, does not want to reflect us in a
mirror of our surface. The artist aims to indicate a light in the darkness of the chaos. OKAMOTO
reveals how our consciousness is controlled, and he gives us a hint about how to make a value
which is rooted by each living.
Pretending to be bad is better than white hypocrisy. That is the reason why I titled this exhibition‘Makkuro Pop’.
OKAMOTO Mitsuhiro (b.1968, Kyoto)
1994 M.A. study of education, Shiga University
1994-96 Studied at The Art Students League of New York
1997-99 CCA Kitakyushu, as a researcher artist
2001-2004 Artist residencies in German, India and Spain
2004-2006 Lives and works in Okinawa and Taiwan
2007- Lives and works in Kyoto
2012- Opens artist run gallery Kunst Arzt in Kyoto
Exhibitions
The Art History of Bishojo - Beautiful Girls, Aomori Museum
FG#546 Illegal Alien 2of Art, Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Shimane Art
2010, acrylic on synthetic leather
Museum, 2014/ Gifu Ogaki Biennale, 2013/ Fukuoka
Contemporary Art Chronicle, Fukuoka Art Museum, Fukuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, 2013/Fashion Fables, Kobe Fashion Museum, 2010/ Strange World, Blackburn Museum & Art Gallery, UK,
2009/ White Cottage, Taiwan, 2008/ Just Love Me, The Royal T, Los Angeles, 2008/ Thermoclineof Art - Asian New Waves, ZKM Museum of Contemporary Art, Karlsruhe, 2007, and many others
EXHIBITION DATA
Artist: OKAMOTO Mitsuhiro
Exhibition Title: Makkuro Pop
Curator: Kudo Takeshi(Aomori Museum of Art)
Date: October 25 – November 22, 2014
Open: 12PM-7PM, closed on Sunday, Monday and National Holidays
Venue: eitoeiko, 32-2 Yaraicho, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-0805, Japan
Phone: +81 (0)3.6873.3830
Contact: ei@eitoeiko.com (Ei Kibukawa/Director of the gallery)