Takashi Murakami People Quotations

I actually feel like the phrase 'big in Japan' is not appropriate for me. The reason is that there are more people who sympathize with my practice in America than there are domestically in Japan.

Japanese people accept that art and commerce will be blended; and, in fact, they are surprised by the rigid and pretentious Western hierarchy of 'high art.'

I'm always looking for ways to connect myself with American people and that American feeling. I'm trying to pick up on the feeling of places, like the Los Angeles feeling or the New York feeling . . . Los Angeles is much better for me that way.

Galleries in the West have probably been looking for exoticism. That's the reason my paintings initially sold well, I think. And then once they started selling, people said my works were very detailed. They may have represented something Japanese to them.

I would like to live to 120, because conceptually, people can survive to 120. Every 20 years, it changes. So maybe, in the next 20 years people can go to space. I don’t know what the next revolution will be. I want to watch.

Contemporary art and manga - what is the same about them? Nothing, right? The manga industry has a lot of talented people, but contemporary art works on more of a solitary model. No one embarks on collaboration in contemporary art in order to make money. But in the manga world, everyone is invested in collaboration. The most important point is that the manga industry constantly encourages new creations and creators.