takashi murakami's the octopus eats it's own leg at mca chicago

ever since leff found out about the murakami retrospective at mca, we have, essentially, had a countdown clock running until the show opened. (longtime readers will NOT be surprised by this.) on saturday, we took the express bus downtown to bask in the superflatness. 

as i had promised on ig, i took ms ko with me. no worries tho, this was her only posed photo.

the show takes up the entire 4th floor

and includes, as is expected in a retrospective (der), some very early works. i didn't take pics of the very painterly, muted pallet paintings at the beginning but, i swear to you, i would NEVER have pegged those as early murakami! (even though thematically, it makes sense. the paint application was  just SO different!)

i am more accustomed to seeing superflat images. (used to subscribe to gr so, that is not surprising!)

mr dob is one of the real reasons why i got hooked on murakami. dobojite? well, look at the guy!

i never tire of dob. for that matter, i can watch "good morning"  for days cause of graduation bear.

here's the evolution of the flowers. from a whole wall (idk, circa 2010? maybe earlier?)

to this *gorgeous* piece from 2015.

but guys. guys. GUYS! around the corner from that painting is what could be described as a temple. and these two huge monsters live there, one on each end. i swear, i screamed and then hit leff when i saw the red guy peeking around the corner.

he casts quite a shadow.

his opposing blue friend.

and another shot for scale.

the sculptures would be enough but there are also massive canvases silkscreened with selective glitter. they GLOW like backlit stained glass! is it because of dark to light printing? idk. they are SUPER impressive. have some details.

i tried to get a long shot for you but it was crowded and, well, these are HUUUGE.

another detail.

leff and i got a membership to mca on saturday SPECIFICALLY to see this show again. lol (i mean, mca always curates so many interesting and diverse shows. it's not *just* for murakami.(although, yeah, it was. bwahaha))

and, double lol, we hit the gift shop. hard. (did not buy a $3500 plush dob tho. even though i'd love one.)

tickets came with free murakami temp tattoos which, if i hadn't been yearning for superflat merch since the early aughts (when i couldn't afford it), would have been enough. super cute!!

we *did* get (not pictured) 1) the show catalog 2) a show poster  (sorta pictured here) 3) two postcards 4) a show tshirt and finally (pictured) 5) two enamel pins.

remember that time i made superflat cupcakes? yeah, well, now i have the pin. i can die happy.

(oh! leff just reminded me that i also made some murakami flower cookies for the bake sale for japan!  (i swear, guys, i make so much stuff that i forget.))

so yes, long story short, if you are in chicago from now until sept 24, 2017 GET YOUR ASS TO THIS RETROSPECTIVE! it is so good.

it is SO good.