Guy Hepner Gallery

Takashi Murakami Korin , Kyoto For Sale

Takashi Murakami
Takashi Murakami - Korin , Kyoto, 2020, Offset print with cold stamp and high gloss varnishing

Korin , Kyoto, 2020

Offset print with cold stamp and high gloss varnishing

30 x 28 in 76.2 x 71.1 cm

About this work

Korin, Kyoto is an offset print with cold stamp and high gloss varnishing, produced by Takashi Murakami in 2020. Measuring 76.2 × 71.1 cm and issued in an edition of 300, the work draws its title from two layered references: Ogata Kōrin (1658–1716), the master of the Rinpa school of Japanese decorative painting whose iconic Irises screen is one of the most celebrated images in Japanese art history; and Kyoto, the ancient imperial capital that served as the cultural and artistic centre of Japan for over a millennium. Together these references situate the work within an explicit dialogue between Murakami's contemporary practice and the classical decorative tradition. The cold stamp and high gloss varnishing add significant material richness to the work, creating areas of reflective metallic sheen and surface depth that reinforce its connection to the luxurious materials of Rinpa lacquerware and gold-ground screen painting. Murakami's engagement with Kōrin is not superficial: he has spoken extensively about the influence of Japanese traditional arts on his practice, and his Superflat philosophy can be understood in part as a critical and celebratory engagement with the non-illusionistic, pattern-based aesthetics of classical Japanese decorative arts. The large format provides the visual space for the work's ornamental imagery to unfold fully. Korin, Kyoto belongs to a distinguished group of works in which Murakami most explicitly bridges his contemporary practice and the long history of Japanese art. The technical enhancements of cold stamp and high gloss varnishing give the edition an object quality that situates it among the most sumptuous of Murakami's print productions. It is a work for collectors who appreciate the depth of the artist's engagement with his own cultural heritage and the extraordinary tradition from which his visual language draws.

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Edition & Provenance

Year
2020
Medium
Offset print with cold stamp and high gloss varnishing
Edition
Edition of 300
Korin , Kyoto

About Takashi Murakami

Takashi Murakami Prints For Sale

Takashi Murakami prints for sale at Guy Hepner Gallery in New York span the full range of his edition output: Superflat flower prints, skull series, Mr. DOB works, Kaikai Kiki editions, and collaborative works that have made Murakami one of the most actively traded artists in the contemporary print market. For collectors seeking Takashi Murakami art for sale — whether an iconic flower screenprint, a limited-edition sculpture multiple, or a major canvas — Guy Hepner at 177 Tenth Avenue, New York offers expert guidance, full provenance documentation, and access to authenticated works across all his major series.

Takashi Murakami (b. 1962, Tokyo) is the defining figure of contemporary Japanese art on the international stage — an artist, theorist, entrepreneur, and studio director whose Superflat theory and the enormously productive practice it generated have permanently altered the conversation about the relationship between high art and popular culture, between Western postwar painting and East Asian visual tradition, and between the studio and the factory. Murakami received his BA, MA, and PhD from the Tokyo University of the Arts in Nihonga — traditional Japanese painting — a rigorous formation that gives his apparently anarchic pop sensibility its underlying structural discipline.

The Superflat manifesto, which Murakami developed and articulated in the early 2000s, proposed that the flattened pictorial space of traditional Japanese painting and the surface-oriented aesthetics of anime and manga were not merely parallel phenomena but expressions of the same deep cultural logic — a logic that Western art history had misread as naivety but which Murakami identified as a sophisticated and distinctive mode of representation.

Murakami's Visual Universe: Flowers, Skulls, and Mr. DOB

Through his practice, Murakami has built a visual universe populated by recurring characters and motifs:

  • Smiling Flowers — deceptively cheerful multi-eyed blossoms that bloom across canvases, prints, and merchandise of enormous scale and colour variety. The flowers are Murakami's most recognisable and actively traded motif in the edition market.
  • Mr. DOB — Murakami's alter ego and running commentary on consumerism; a hybrid figure drawing on anime, cartoon, and pop art traditions
  • Skulls — rendered in the manner of traditional Japanese vanitas imagery, these works bridge his engagement with the history of Japanese craft and his fascination with mortality and popular culture
  • Kaikai and Kiki — his studio mascots, which appear across prints, sculptures, and merchandise as embodiments of the Kaikai Kiki production ethos
  • Flower Ball — large-scale sphere compositions made of repeating flower motifs; among his most sought-after sculptural and print works

Takashi Murakami: Kaikai Kiki Studio and Production

Murakami's Kaikai Kiki studio and production company — employing dozens of assistants in an explicit homage to both the Japanese craft workshop and Warhol's Factory — produces paintings, sculptures, editions, merchandise, and cultural events with equal seriousness and commercial intent. This model, in which studio production, cultural criticism, and commercial output are deliberately merged, is central to understanding Murakami's practice and the edition market that surrounds it.

Murakami: Major Collaborations and Cultural Reach

Murakami's major collaborations have extended his work into fashion, music, and popular culture on a global scale. His partnership with Louis Vuitton produced some of the most successful fashion-art collaborations of the 2000s. His album artwork for Kanye West's Graduation brought his visual language to audiences that had no prior engagement with contemporary art. His collaborations with Supreme and other streetwear brands have ensured that his work circulates across youth culture as readily as it does in museum collections.

These collaborations have expanded the collector base for his fine art editions significantly: many collectors who first encountered Murakami through fashion or music have subsequently acquired prints and multiples, creating sustained demand across a wider demographic than most contemporary artists command.

Takashi Murakami: Market and Auction Results

Murakami's auction record stands at $15,200,000 for My Lonesome Cowboy (1998) at Sotheby's New York in 2008, and major paintings continue to command seven-figure results. His edition prints and multiples — flower series, skulls, Mr. DOB, Kaikai Kiki — are among the most actively traded in the contemporary edition market globally. Print prices range from $3,000–$5,000 for smaller open editions through $50,000–$200,000+ for rare signed limited editions and artist proofs in high demand colourways.

Murakami's work is held in permanent collections at MoMA, MOCA Los Angeles, the Asian Art Museum San Francisco, Tate Modern, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, the Centre Pompidou, the Rubell Museum, and the Mori Art Museum Tokyo.

What to Look For When Buying Takashi Murakami Prints

Edition size: Murakami produces both open-edition merchandise-style prints and tightly limited fine art editions. The latter — often numbered to 50 or fewer, with hand signature and certificate of authenticity from Kaikai Kiki — carry the strongest value and market liquidity.

Motif and colourway: Flower works in rare colourways, skull editions, and Mr. DOB prints consistently outperform peripheral motifs. Rainbow colourways and gold/metallic editions typically carry premium over standard colourways.

Authentication: All fine art editions should come with Kaikai Kiki certificates of authenticity and, for works sold through Perrotin or other authorised galleries, original gallery documentation.

Condition: Murakami's prints are typically produced on archival substrates, but condition remains important — works stored and framed correctly hold value most reliably.

Buy Takashi Murakami Art For Sale at Guy Hepner Gallery, New York

Guy Hepner offers a curated selection of Takashi Murakami prints for sale and edition multiples across all his major series from our gallery at 177 Tenth Avenue, New York. We bring expert knowledge of the Murakami edition market and offer free, confidential valuations for collectors looking to sell or appraise their holdings. Whether you are seeking an iconic flower print, a skull series multiple, or a rare signed limited edition, Guy Hepner provides the market expertise, authentication assurance, and collector access to support every acquisition.

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