Yasumasa Morimura (b. 1951)

Art as a Mirror: Identity, Appropriation, and Transformation

Yasumasa Morimura is one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary Japanese art. Born in Osaka in 1951, his practice unfolds at the crossroads of photography, performance, and installation, in a continuous exploration of identity, gender, history, and representation.

Since the late 1980s, Morimura has developed a conceptual and iconoclastic body of work by reinterpreting — and literally embodying — iconic images from Western art history, classic cinema, and pop culture. Through his self-portraits, he assumes the personas of figures as diverse as Frida Kahlo, Marilyn Monroe, Van Gogh, or subjects from Manet, Velázquez, and Rembrandt, critically and playfully challenging dominant visual narratives.

Far from mere parody, Morimura’s work is a deliberate act of critical appropriation and reinterpretation. Each image is meticulously constructed through elaborate costumes, set design, and makeup, with the artist himself as the sole subject. In this act of transformation, he becomes a medium for examining masculinity and femininity, East and West, the original and the copy — simultaneously subverting and paying homage to global cultural references.

Morimura represented Japan at the Venice Biennale and has exhibited in major institutions including the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, SFMOMA, and Fundación La Caixa. His work, both playful and deeply political, invites viewers to reconsider the familiar through the lens of artifice and reflection.

Through his unique “theatre of the self,” Yasumasa Morimura turns the image into a tool for questioning norms, dismantling stereotypes, and asserting transformation as a powerful form of freedom.