The diversity of Yoshitomo Nara’s followers is an achievement seldom reached by a living artist. With a strong sub-culture cult following across the globe, combined with fine art pieces realizing prices of over one million US dollars, Nara’s meteoric rise to prominence within the past decade comes as no surprise. With this growth in status comes growth in value; Nara’s works have more than doubled in investment worth since 2004, and continue to thrive in a demanding world market.

Nara began his rapid ascension within the art world in the 1990s, and is often closely associated with Japanese artistic movements of that period. His work is commonly attributed as belonging to Takashi Murakami’s “Superflat,” an artistic theory which draws clear inspiration from Japanese manga and anime, with ties and forays into otaku pop-culture fanatic obsession. However, while Nara’s works share characteristics of Superflat in the use of simple lines and lack of visual dimension, the subject matter vastly differs from that of most Superflat artists. Murakami developed the theory as a mocking critique for consumerism and cultural objectification within the society around him, and often employs the sexualization reminiscent of fetishist Lolita culture, along with playful and childish imagery. In such subject matter, Nara takes a distinct departure from the movement. His works do not focus on a consumerist culture, and the children he depicts are neither sexual nor childish. Indeed, Nara himself rejects the clichéd association of his work with Superflat, distancing himself by stating: “the entire 1990s, the entire decade, I was not even in Japan. I was absent. It’s a mystery to me why I’m so often associated with a movement that is so specific to that time and to that place.”