Apr 10, 2025 - Sale 2699

Sale 2699 - Lot 189

Price Realized: $ 5,250
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000

TADANORI YOKOO (1936- )


A la Maison de Civecawa / [The Rose-Colored Dance]. With invitation and poem in envelope to Yoshito Ohno.
Silkscreen poster. 1043x738 mm; 41x29 inches. 1965.

This poster was designed for a performance by Tatsumi Hijikata's Butoh dance company. Included is the original invitation sprinkled with gold leaf, designed by Natsuyuki Nakanishi, and a poem by Ikuo Kato, addressed to Yoshito Ohno. Yoshito Ohno (1938-2020) was a distinguished Butoh dancer and son of Kazuo Ohno, the co-founder of modern Butoh.

Yokoo initiated an artistic revolution in Japan, introducing pop art into Japanese graphics. From 1965, when he first found his trademark style, he produced wild and unexpected images, mixing Japanese and Western imagery. His style is unique, independent of trend or current, constantly evolving and always flamboyant. Here, for the "Ankoku Butoh Ha" dance company, Yokoo begins a long collaboration with the avant-garde Tokyo theater and dance movement. The poster bears traditional Japanese imagery, such as the rising sun (one of Yokoo's favorite motifs) and the great wave, along with a depiction of the Japanese Bullet Train, and an exquisite mixture of classical Western painting: "Gabrielle Distole and Her Sister" an anonymous French painting of the Fontainebleau School.

Yokoo p. 68 no. 279.