Regular readers will be in no doubt as to my credentials relative to Tokyo's modern art scene. I believe in art, and when people in Tokyo want a uninformed opinion on an upcoming gallery opening, I am many a Tokyo insider's first point of call.
If I have been to one gallery opening I have been to a thousand. And for good reasons. Most gallery openings nearly always have all 4 of my most favorites things.
Polished wooden floor boards.
Recently painted white walls.
Cheese.
White wine.
For the longest time I never used to find any pleasure in art, but the strangest thing happened about 5 years ago. After many years of being a hard core sports fan, my vocational circumstances suddenly meant I was never home to watch TV when sport was being broadcast. Within a short space of time, I completely lost touch with my teams, and before too much longer I lost all interest in sport.
Now I just find it all so completely pathetic and irrelevant.
Getting back to art. I am convinced that most thinking people go through a phase in their lives during which they are unable to appreciate or derive simple pleasure from intrinsically beautiful objects and concepts. Some are lucky to have this bred out of them by enlightened and sophisticated people around them.
Sadly though, for the most part, most people never seem to achieve any understanding or means of appreciating for art. Such people find minimal appeal in pursuits such as the theatre, ballet, and fashion, but always seem to be able to find ample time for low brow, down market pursuits such as sports, automobile racing, and television.
I'm glad I am not like that any more.
Anyway, in order to write a sophisticated post about art for the bums and degenerates my blog seems to attract, I realised that I needed to do a bit of hunting around on the topic before hand. In doing so I fully expected to find my favorite painting of all time; 'A Friend in Need'. Better known as the 'The dogs playing poker',
And I did. But I also stumbled onto something just as good. People who recreate art of Lego. Take this MC Escher piece. It must have taken some idiot days.
This next one below is not as elaborate, but its still a good idea. Points taken away for the non Lego hair.
There are literally hundreds of these. Its great stuff isn't it. In fact, most of the worlds most famous works have now been recreated in Lego.
Soaking up all of this Lego sculptures got my interest in art flowing. Before too long I found myself rubbing shoulders with other well educated, wealthy people at the National Art Center, Tokyo in Roppongi.
If my google analytic stats are anything to go by, you and my readers probably haven't been to this, or any other art galleries lately. You may however have seen pictures of it and its spectacular facade designed by Kisho Kurokawa.
I didn't have time to go inside and have a look at the exhibits but I did have a spare 20 minutes to walk around the exterior and the lobby.
The lobby is absolutely breathtaking. Like an open air canyon.
The massive concrete pylons that punctuate the lobby expanse are topped by upscale cafes and restaurants full of well dressed, good looking people. Such a breath of fresh air after walking through Roppongi before hand.
Forget the art and have lunch. I was kind of sorry I had my normal Subway footlong.
That's the finish of this post then. Piss off.
