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Keiichi Tanaami, 1936–2024
By Annette Meier
Portrait of KEIICHI TANAAMI. Courtesy Nanzuka Underground gallery, Tokyo.
The Japanese pop artist Keiichi Tanaami passed away on August 9 after a two-month battle with myelodysplastic syndrome (a rare blood cancer). The news was announced by Tokyo-based art gallery Nanzuka Underground, which revealed that the 88-year-old had been receiving medical treatment since June, but was ultimately unable to recover from a subarachnoid hemorrhage.
Considered a pioneer of Japanese pop art and a forerunner of the Superflat movement, Tanaami rose to prominence in the 1960s with vibrant paintings, sculptures, and films reflecting his childhood memories of World War II and the influence of American pop culture in postwar Japan. Elements of manga and Neo-Dadaism permeate his work, along with recurrent imagery of United States military jets, flares, and exploding bombs, inspired by real and imagined events.
Born in 1936 to a textile wholesaler in Tokyo, Tanaami was barely six years old when the American military firebombed the city. Though his family sought refuge at his grandfather’s house, he later witnessed the 1945 Tokyo Air Raid that killed up to 100,000 residents, most of whom were civilians. The ghastly images of death and destruction were seared into Tanaami’s young mind, impacting his perspective on the world and, eventually, his art practice.
Tanaami’s love for drawing began in high school. Initially hoping to become a manga artist, he studied design at the Musashino Art University in Kodaira, Western Tokyo, where, in his second year, he won a special selection award in the Japan Advertising Art Exhibition. After graduating he worked at an advertising agency, but resigned after nearly a year to focus on private commissions.
During the 1960s, Tanaami worked as a successful illustrator and graphic designer, while actively participating in the Neo-Dada Organizers group alongside his friend and fellow artist Ushio Shinohara. The two shared an affinity for Americana, particularly Hollywood films, which they often viewed in rundown cinemas. Tanaami was fascinated by the shift from kamishibai—a form of street theater and storytelling that was popular in postwar Japan—to pre-recorded entertainment. Eager to explore a new genre of video art, he took part in events staged by avant-garde artists such as Yoko Ono and Nam June Paik, and made his first animated film, titled Marionettes in Masks (1965), which was screened at the inaugural Sogetsu Animation Festival that same year.
Following his first trip to New York in 1967 (which included a stop at Andy Warhol’s studio, the Factory), Tanaami began to travel between Japan and the US. The flashy American pop art scene resonated with him, and he became inspired to pioneer its Japanese variant, combining elements from both cultures.
In 1971, Tanaami made the animated shorts Good-bye Elvis and USA and Good-bye Marilyn for his debut solo exhibition “Cinema Demonstration” at Tokyo’s Sogetsu Art Center. Though only a few minutes long, these animations—for which he drew hundreds of frames by hand—are rife with sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll music, referencing the counterculture at the time.
The year 1975 was especially significant for Tanaami, as he produced the films Sweet Friday and Crayon Angel, and hosted the joint exhibition “Far from Cinema – Film Exhibition” at Tokyo’s Seibu Theater with Japanese video artist Toshio Matsumoto. In these works, he explored his muddled memories of the war as well as his growing uncertainties about America’s status in Japan. At the same time, he secured more commercial gigs, designing Japan-release album covers for American bands such as The Monkees and Jefferson Airplane, and even becoming the first art director of the Japanese edition of Playboy magazine.
Tanaami was in his 60s when he was finally recognized for his groundbreaking contributions to the Japanese pop art movement. From 1991 onward, he was a professor at the Kyoto University of Art and Design, where he also served as the chairperson of the Department of Information Design.
In 1998, he secured his first commercial representation with Tokyo’s Nishimura Gallery, and has been represented by Nanzuka Underground since its opening in 2006. Shinji Nanzuka, chief director of the namesake gallery, paid his respects to the artist: “During his lifetime, Tanaami had described his recent animations and paintings as ‘the world in which [he] will live in after death.’ I am sure that Tanaami’s soul will continue to live forever in this paradise that he himself has built, enjoying his time with his wife, friends, and all the strange yet marvelous creatures and monsters that inhabit it.”
Tanaami passed away just two days after the launch of his major retrospective “Keiichi Tanaami: Adventures in Memory” at the National Art Center in Tokyo. The memory-themed exhibition traces the last six decades of his career, featuring debut works such as the silkscreen print No More War (1967) alongside more recent work, including the chimeric sculpture Inconceivable Body (2019), and his colorful, large-scale paintings Realm of the Afterlife / Realm of the Living (2017), The Story of Death and Rebirth (2019), and Presence (2022).
His artworks are in the collections of prominent museums across the world, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the M+ museum in Hong Kong.
Per his wishes, Tanaami’s funeral was held privately, with a public farewell ceremony to be announced later.
Annette Meier is an editorial intern at ArtAsiaPacific.
