“To me, religions are a narrative…Natural catastrophes, earthquakes, are things caused by nature. Such chaos is natural, but we have to make sense of it somehow, and so we had to invent these stories. That is what I wanted to paint.”
—Takashi Murakami

Chelsea is known for being a neighborhood centered around the arts with its over 25 galleries in a 5 block 3 avenue radius (plus more!), and one you should definitely make a point to see is way over on 24th Street at 12th Ave (it’s OK though, because it’s been warmer lately!): Takashi Murakami at Gagosian Gallery: “In the Land of the Dead, Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow.”

My suggestion is you take a train to probably one of my favorite New York ‘hoods for the exhibit because it’s STUNNING (like these photographs are pretty cool, but they do not even come close to these gigantic paintings and sculptures that will leave you questioning of course the existence of life, our origins, and just how imaginative one can get in creating the story of how to put this all together.)

The exhibit goes through the 17th of January 2015.

“Tan Tan Bo—In Communication”, 2014

“Isle of the Dead”, 2014

“Invoking the Vitality of a Universe Beyond Imagination”, 2014 Mixed media

“In the Land of the Dead, Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow” Installation View

(all original works by Takashi Murakami via The Gagosian Gallery; photos by Kaitlin Duffy)