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This is the sixth artwork in the Revolver collection of prints produced using a gravure printing press. It is the final illustration in the series.(sale on this site by lottery.)
"Roses are blooming on Me's face! Sheeh!"
Iyami is a character who claims to have just returned from France and repeatedly makes snarky remarks. The man with three buck teeth in Fujio Akatsuka's manga Osomatsu-kun took Japan by storm in the 1960s with the way he raises one arm and one leg when startled, and shouts "Sheeh!". He calls himself "me." He calls all others "chimi." He ends his sentences with "zansu." Tanaami re-creates Iyami him as a powerful presence, and scatters roses inside and outside of Iyami's face,
Nancy is a children's comic strip that dates to the 1930s. It has been serialized in the US for a long time with changing authors, but Tanaami refers to the American comic book by its first author, Ernie Bushmiller. Shots of Nancy seen diagonally from behind appear frequently in the original work. Depending on how the story plays out, the reader is left to guess whether she is laughing, angry, confused, or indeed something else, and they must envision her invisible facial expression.
What would Nancy look like when she spies a man with roses blooming from his face and a fighter plane with a shark head (reminiscent of the Curtiss P-40 from World War II) next to her? Judging by the way Nyarome points at her with burning eyes and mouth agape, it must have been quite a unique expression on her face.
※Signature on the print (hand written)
Tanaami was born in Tokyo in 1936, graduated from Musashino Art University, and awarded a special prize by the Japan Advertising Artists Club in 1958. Having immersed in American counterculture and pop art since the 1960s, he was an independent artist who had been actively crossing boundaries to pursue his creative endeavors, which range from animation to silk screens, manga-like illustrations, collages, experimental films, paintings, three-dimensional works, and more, without restricting himself to any medium or genre. Inspired by his encounter with Andy Warhol, he had continued to experimentally challenge the major themes tackled by contemporary art today, such as art and design, art and products, everyday beauty, and the public and art, while using the design methodology of editing to the present day. Through more than half a century of creative activities, he has gained a high reputation worldwide as one of the pioneers of pop art, which symbolizes postwar Japan. Tanaami's recent major exhibitions include Keiichi Tanaami: Adventures in Memory (2024, The National Art Center Tokyo, Tokyo), TANAAMI!! AKATSUKA!! That’ s All Right!!(2023, PARCO MUSEUM TOKYO, Tokyo)the solo exhibitions Manhattan Universe (2022, Venus Over Manhattan, New York), A Mirror of the World (2022, Nanzuka, Tokyo), Tokyo Pop Underground (2019, Jeffrey Deitch, New York), and Keiichi Tanaami (2019, Kunstmuseum Luzern, Lucerne, Switzerland); as well as the group exhibitions Tokyo: Art & Photography (2021, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford), The World Goes Pop (2015, Tate Modern, London), International Pop (2015, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, USA), and many others. His work is in the permanent collections of MoMA (New York), Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), Art Institute of Chicago, M+ (Hong Kong), National Portrait Gallery (Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.), and Hamburger Bahnhof Museum for Contemporary Art (Berlin).
It all happened after the Second World War. During Japan's postwar economic boom, gravure printing was used to produce countless images. The vivid colors captivated the people. The term "gravure idol" is derived from gravure printing.The times have since changed. Gravure printing presses were massive, making them unsuitable for printing small numbers of copies. At the end of 2021, Shueisha's gravure printing era came to a close.Although they have become obsolete in commercial printing, printing techniques such as lithography have found their way into the fine arts. However, given the scale and mechanics of gravure printing, once operations are halted, it is extremely difficult to get them up and running again.Machines capable of printing hundreds of thousands of copies were used for edition prints of just over 100 copies each. The resulting prints were mounted on aluminum composite panels for smoothness and preservation and housed in colorful custom-made boxes.
The original box includes a blockchain-linked sales certificate
All works are registered to Startrail PORT, NFT management service. Works include a blockchain-linked sales certificate with an affixed NFC tag sticker (letterpress printed by Kazui Press). You can view the information recorded on the NFT by scanning the NFC tag sticker with a smartphone. We will send you your product in an original Shueisha Manga-Art Heritage box.
Work Size 1082mm x 754mm
Paper used White Kingdom
Printing Method Gravure Print
Package Contents
Main product
Blockchain-linked sales certificate (letterpress printed by Kazui Press, linked with NFC tag sticker)
Instruction manual
Booklet
Storage case
