KAWS

Perrotin is proud to announce simultaneous exhibitions in its Tokyo and Hong Kong galleries by the multifaceted
American artist KAWS. Both shows represent a homecoming of sorts for KAWS, who fortified his creative career in Tokyo in the early-2000s and was the first artist to exhibit in the gallery’s Hong Kong space in 2012.
Considered one of the most relevant artists of his generation,
KAWS engages audiences beyond the museums and galleries in
which he regularly exhibits. His prolific body of influential work
straddles the worlds of art and design to include paintings, murals,
large-scale sculptures, street art, and graphic and product design.
Over the last two decades KAWS has built a successful career
with work that consistently shows his formal agility as an artist, as
well as his underlying wit, irreverence, and affection for our times.
He often draws inspiration and appropriates from pop culture
animations to form a unique artistic vocabulary for his works across
various mediums.
Now admired for his larger-than-life sculptures and hardedge paintings
that emphasize line and color, KAWS’ cast of hybrid cartoon and
human characters are perhaps the strongest examples of his
exploration of humanity. His refined graphic language revitalizes
figuration with big, bold gestures and keen, playful intricacy.
As seen in his collaborations with global brands, KAWS’ imagery
possesses a sophisticated humor and reveals a thoughtful
interplay with consumer products. Highly sought-after by
collectors inside and outside of the art world, KAWS’ artworks,
with their broad appeal, establish him as a uniquely prominent
artist in today’s culture.
KAWS (b. 1974, Jersey City, New Jersey; lives and works in
Brooklyn, New York) has exhibited internationally in major
museums.
His recent solo exhibitions include KAWS: WHERE THE END
STARTS, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Texas (2016) which
traveled to the Yuz Museum, Shanghai (2017); KAWS, Yorkshire
Sculpture Park and Longside Gallery, West Yorkshire, United
Kingdom (2016).
His work has also been the subject of solo exhibitions at the
Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, Missouri (2017); Brooklyn
Museum, New York (2015); Centro de Arte Contemporáneo,
Málaga, Spain (2014); Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art,
Overland Park, Kansas (2013); Pennsylvania Academy of Fine
Arts, Philadelphia (2013); and the High Art Museum, Atlanta,
Georgia (2011).