Comic Wallet #4: Beautiful Flowers from Shadow Star
~ Sam
there is such a thing as Western Superflat!
check out this article on Charlie Immer, my new favorite artist? (i say that a lot):
http://thefoxisblack.com/2011/03/18/the-crazy-candy-coated-paintings-of-charlie-immer/
What is Superflat?: Where Anime fits in Post-Modern Culture
A panel discussion with speakers Sam Kusek and Eric Shorey
Join us as we try and parse through the difficulties and nuances of the complex neologism coined by Takashi Murakami: “Superflat.” Usually used to refer to a specific style or group of post-modern Japanese artists (Yoshitomo Nara, Chiho Aoshima, Satoshi Kon, among others), Superflat art self-reflexively critiques and celebrates anime and otaku culture. The tropes of superflatism include: one dimensionality, saturated color, hyper-sexuality and infantaliziation, blurred lines between fantasy and reality, fetishism (cultural and sexual), and the ambiguous engagement with a kind of national-character mythos (often with the atom bomb) and late capitalist economic structures.
Contradictorily: “Superflat” can also be used to describe certain phenomena within Asian (and sometimes American) culture, the same phenomena that Superflat art often criticizes. So things like: Power Rangers, Street Fighter, Ultraman, and Godzilla can appropriately be called “Superflat” as well. Can Superflat also be seen as a sensibility, a mode of engaging with anime and other cultural texts? What anime can be criticized by a super-flat apparatus, and what anime could be called Superflat?
This panel will specifically discuss various movies, games, and cultural phenomenon like: FLCL, Paranoia Agent, the Street Fighter franchise of video games, and Hello Kitty. Through this discussion, we will atempt to create a more concrete definition of Superflat and figure out where and how anime can and should be analyzed under a post-modern lens.
Anime Boston, April 23, 10pm
(we are super excited.)
