The Death of Painting

2022, Oil on Italian Linen, 40 x 40cm

On the surface, this is yet another take on perennially sobering memento-mori imagery. But the composition is darker than its candy coloured, cheerfully grinning Takashi Murakami floral adornments might suggest. Every generation of artist proclaims theirs to be the final word: the Death of Painting. And certainly Murakami, with his factory-produced commercialised Superflat paintings, fits the profile. Putting aside the existentiality of death, this jazzed up memento-mori comments on the rank commercialization of the art-making process which, sadly, reduces high profile creatives to factory ringmasters. When the soul-fulfilling joy of giving birth to a one-of-a-kind work of art is stripped away, it can, indeed be likened to that of a death.