IMAGE IN THE MAKING : A DIALOGUE IN JAPAN POSTWAR ART DISCOURSE

Abstract

This dissertation explores how ‘image’ is used in the construction of Japan’s postwar art discourses, which would be discussed through the works of mainly a few Japanese artists: Arata Isozaki, and Takashi Murakami, and Kaichiro Morikawa. The inquiry to the beginning of Japanese modernity would commence this paper, pertinent to the period after the atomic bomb attack (1945). It would be shown through Fredric Jameson’s stages of modernity that Japan attempts to separate itself from the West in its search for ‘self’ (Japanese spirit), through the process of ‘overcoming’ its inferiorities. The second part of the dissertation would explore the creation of Japanese images in the narratives of art discourse in search for ‘self’, which are very much affected by the Hiroshima bombing. Isozaki’s work “Future City” would be discussed with reference to the images employed in defining Japan architecture. Japan pop art would be explored, where most anime artists centralize on ‘apocalypse’ and create cartoon narratives as means of comfort to suppress the grim reality in their society. The proliferation of anime images throughout the post-war era results in Otaku subculture, which characterizes postmodernism. Finally, the dissertation would concentrate on Akihabara and Otaku taste, and this paper would show an underlying image of this subculture, that is of fetishism. Morikawa’s critics on the Otaku room and AUM Shinrikyo would be discussed based on explorations on fetishism. It would be shown that Morikawa’s structuring on image rather naïve and superficial. Subsequently, this paper concludes that the construction of Japanese art discourses involves the idea of reversal, which is the taking of inferior quality image, which are reversed to convey a message that ‘overcomes’ the modern. However, there is a discrepancy in Japan’s move towards the modern, in trying to ‘overcome’, it finds itself struggling in breaking away from the Western influence.