Contemporary Artist Takashi Murakami Faces Bankruptcy Due to Covid-19

By Charmaine Shaharin  •  07 Jul 2020 in Design

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The coronavirus once again continues to impact the Art Industry and this time, its target is a legend of the art world business model, Takashi Murakami. The Japanese contemporary artist, who is mostly known for his signature paintings of colourful smiling flowers and Mr.DOB, has revealed that he is on the brink of bankruptcy.

In a 15 minute video on Instagram, shot inside his studio where his employees are busy working in the background, Murakami explains the heartbreaking story about how his gallery and arts company Kaikai Kiki is on the verge of facing bankruptcy and how most of the projects have to come to a halt or be cancelled. That being said, as first reported by Hypebeast, the video was also shot more than a month prior to its release a week ago as subtitles accompany the 15-minute video.

 

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This spring, I streamed a series of cooking show of a sort on Instagram Live. I’m sure those who watched them were utterly confused, but I was trying to buoy my own thoroughly sunken feelings through these streamings. With the sudden swoop of COVID-19 pandemic, my company faced bankruptcy and I had to give up on a number of projects, the most symbolic of which being the production of my sci-fi feature film, Jellyfish Eyes Part 2: Mahashankh. For nine long years, I had persevered! It was a film that was to realize my childish dreams! The enormous budget I poured into this project, as well as my tenacious persistence, put a constant and tremendous stress on my company’s operation for the past nine years. But at the same time, I was able to endure various hardships because I had this project. Faced with the current predicament, however, I was persuaded by both my business consultant and tax attorney that I must, simply must try and drastically reduce our business tax by filing the film’s production cost as tax-exempt expenditure. To that end, I am going to produce and release a series of videos to publicly announce the discontinuation of the film’s production. (To be clear, this is an entirely legitimate procedure—I’m not trying to evade tax!) These videos will be released against the backdrop of our struggle to avoid an economic catastrophe, but perhaps it may have a cathartic effect on the viewers/my followers to see the story of stupid Murakami’s failure. Long story short, I’m a silly human being for whom the moment of bliss is when I am thinking my truly childish sci-fi thoughts. I don’t know how many episodes the series will end up being, but a series it will be, so please come along with me on this journey for a little while.

A post shared by Takashi Murakami (@takashipom) on Jun 30, 2020 at 8:02am PDT

Murakami also explains that one of his special upcoming projects, which was a sci-fi feature film called Jellyfish Eyes Part 2: Mahashankh, has been terminated. He said,

“For nine long years, I had persevered! It was a film that was to realize my childish dreams! The enormous budget I poured into this project, as well as my tenacious persistence, put constant and tremendous stress on my company’s operation for the past nine years. But at the same time, I was able to endure various hardships because I had this project.”

The artist soon went on to explain that he would produce and release a series of videos to publicly announce the discontinuation of the film’s production. He said, “I don’t know how many episodes the series will end up being, but a series it will be, so please come along with me on this journey for a little while.”

In the meantime, Murakami is still working on collaborations with Kanye West and Kid Cudi on their upcoming animated show KIDS SEE GHOSTS. Other projects of his include the wildly successful recent release of his Uniqlo collaboration with singer, Billie Eilish.

For more info, check out his Instagram here

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