Museum of Contemporary Art, Taipei

This spring, the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Taipei officially presents MIKA NINAGAWA, which is the largest solo exhibition since the artist’s debut. This exhibition introduces Ninagawa’s complete works created in the past twenty years, displaying and contextualizing the essence of her versatile creative career. From its form to content, the exhibition gradually lures audience into Ninagawa’s unique and fascinating world of images. Ninagawa started photography since she was in college and engaged in various public contests. At that time, a new wave of female photographers emerged and Ninagawa also grasped the attention of the Japanese art circle and eventually awarded the Kimura Ihei Photography Award in 2001. Her distinctive visual style and aesthetics in photography made her incredible success in both photography and the commercial market. Ninagawa also started her career as a film director. Her first film Sakuran in 2007, and second film Helter Skelter in 2012, were well-received by the industry, critics, media, and achieved a box-office success. Since then, the artist has been continuously collaborating with the pop culture industry, filming music videos for famous international idols and stars, and making commercials and advertisements for various products. Ninagawa herself has also become a celebrity, active in the entertainment world and received much attention from the media all the time. At the beginning of 2015, Ninagawa launched her own brand “M/mika ninagawa”, introducing clothing lines filled with designs of her signature style and actively venturing into the fashion industry. In addition, while her artistic career and brands have been progressing, the Tokyo Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games has also officially invited Ninagawa to be a member of the committee for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. This shows the attraction and influence of her artistic achievements is constantly expanding in different respects and direction. Ninagawa’s solo exhibition at MOCA, Taipei not only showcases her representative series of works in the past two decades, such as Flowers, Liquid Dreams, Sakura, Portraits, Self-image, PLANT A TREE, noir, etc., she also specially designs an installation space entitled, MIKA LAND, in which audience could see the diverse results and progress the artist has made throughout the years in video-making, commercial product design, and fashion design. The audience can therefore see Ninagawa’s prolific creativity and be fully immersed in her artistic talents. In terms of content and viewing sequence, the exhibition is divided into three sections. The first floor introduces a mixture of natural and artificial beauty in radiant colors, implicitly tackling the phenomenon of worshipping and pursuing beauty and its inherent conflicts in the Japanese consumer culture. The second floor reveals to the audience a more personal and private realm of the artist. In R201, the largest gallery in the museum, the atmosphere changes again and surfaces as a circus-like world of joy and fun for the audience’s participation. This space could also be viewed as an achievement room that marks and shares the sweet fruits of her endeavors after decades of diligent work in the art field. With absolute confidence and ceaseless efforts, Ninagawa declares that photography is not just a way to represent images but an excellent medium and means for self-assertion and self-realization. The most ancient is also the most advanced. Ninagawa uses this saying as the central concept and collaborates with the famous “Dogo Onsen” hot spring in Ehime Prefecture, Shikoku, Japan this year. She converts the ancient architecture and streets into a cultural and artistic space filled with multicolored flowers of incredible charm, inaugurating the Mika Ninagawa × Dogo Onsen DOGO ART 2015. This year, all kinds of events and activities of World Design Capital are launching in Taipei. The historical architecture of MOCA Taipei is also transformed with a new look and ambience because of the appearance, rejuvenation and decoration of the dazzling, brilliant MIKA NINAGAWA. When integration of art, design and the cultural and creative industry becomes a prominent issue and the entire world is competing on the same stage, this exhibition unquestionably serves as a great model of emulation and reflection. As the MIKA NINAGAWA exhibition and its world tour is a successful example of how an individual artist transforms into a global brand, it is without doubt that it will bring about more creativity around the world and set in motion a chain effect of making “those who have the ability aspire to be the same.