Tanaami Keiichi Pleasure of Picasso—Mother and Child

Angela Liu:

Take a closer look at this group of artworks, which seem like Picasso paintings. Did you notice any unusual details, like cartoonish elements or even Mickey Mouse? In fact, these are by the Japanese artist and graphic designer Tanaami Keiichi. During the early days of COVID-19, Tanaami, like many of us, felt alone and isolated with no clear end in sight for the pandemic. To lift his spirits, he decided to recapture the joy of sketching he felt in his childhood by recreating the works of another key artistic predecessor—Picasso. He found solace in this practice. In his words, ‘[T]he simple act of just copying what I liked without giving it much thought was something that [is] so amusing, and it also helped calm my mind and body.’

For Tanaami, Picasso is an artist who embodies the joy of creativity. This series is as much a homage to Picasso as it is an act of self-care. Tanaami created more than 500 of these paintings, and he did not stop until he passed away in 2024, making these his final works. When we look at these colourful paintings, we’re reminded of how creativity has the potential to offer comfort and purpose especially in difficult times.

NARRATOR:

Between 2020 and 2023, Tanaami Keiichi created a series of more than 500 acrylic paintings titled Pleasure of Picasso–Mother and Child. Thirty-four of the paintings from the series are featured in the exhibition The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: Picasso for Asia–A Conversation. The works come in different dimensions, with heights and widths ranging from thirty to sixty-six centimetres.

All works in this series are inspired by Pablo Picasso, referencing his compositions and expressions. Like Picasso, Tanaami Keiichi depicts a subject from multiple viewpoints, and he also incorporated subjects that have appeared in Picasso’s work. The paintings feature distorted portraits, visible erasures, dense patterns, and geometric shapes in a vivid and contrasting palette. Let’s describe two of the paintings in more detail:

Created between 2020 and 2021, Pleasure of Picasso—Mother and Child No.074 depicts a figure with large eyes and full red lips, wearing a yellow top and a red bottom. Seated in a brown chair with armrests and a backrest, the figure gazes to the left. The background is a light greyish green. The figure is shown from the head, which is disproportionately large and takes up half the composition, to the top of the thighs. They wear a hat with a brown crown and a decorative green band, with a brim that is blue on the left of the image and red on the right. The person’s asymmetrical face looks like a composite of two perspectives: the left eye is higher and fully visible, while the right eye is shown in profile. The nose is represented by two nasal wings oriented in the same direction, and the tilted ear on the right protrudes from the right temple. The figure’s hands are on the armrests, with fingers contorted and overlapping. The pose recalls Picasso’s 1937 painting Seated Woman with Arms Crossed. A smaller grey figure stands on the larger figure’s lap. This second figure has a head and four limbs but no torso. They look up while bending backwards, balancing on the larger figure’s thighs with one leg and one arm. The free leg is folded over the head to the left, while the free arm hangs in mid-air to the right. The figure echoes Picasso’s 1930 painting The Acrobat.

Another work, Pleasure of Picasso—Mother and Child 0308, was completed in 2020 and features a mother and her son. The mother stands directly behind the son, her broad figure filling the whole canvas. As she lowers her head to look down at her child, the angle of her head forms a wide arc with her shoulders. Their hands are intertwined, as if she is supporting him while he learns to walk. The boy wears a black cap with what appear to be Mickey Mouse ears and a red-and-blue outfit reminiscent of Ultraman. One of his legs is bent at the knee while the other is taking a step forward. He has asymmetrical facial features, with one eye higher than the other. The background is black, a sharp contrast to the brightly coloured figures. In the top left corner of the canvas, Tanaami Keiichi’s name and the year ‘2020’ appear in white, along with the texts ‘38PICASSO’ in red, which means Tanaami Keiichi completed the painting on the 8th of March. In the top right corner, Picasso’s name, the work’s title Mother and Child in French, and the year ‘1943’ appear in white.