Kota Hirakawa
"The Power of FOX"

Kota Hirakawa

Bambinart Gallery is pleased to announce the solo exhibition by Kota Hirakawa "The Power of FOX" from March 18 through April 10, 2011.

Hirakawa (b. 1987 in Saitama prefecture) is graduating this March after studying oil painting at Tama Art University. He has been an active participang in exhibitions even as a student.
In 2010, he held a solo exhibition at MARUKI GALLERY for THE HIROSHIMA PANELS in Saitama, questioning the meaning of peace in a world plagued by conflict and constant fear of terrorist attacks.

This time, his exhibition "The Power of FOX" present artworks dealing with the authenticity of mass media.
"FOX" signifies both the animal and FOX Broadcasting Company (FBC) in the United States. Fox as FBC is well-known as a strongly Republican channel. Although media supposedly functions as an objective transmitter of information, their broadcasts are often fashioned in a manner that suit political interets. Meanwhile, fox as an animal represent the wilderness. However, as a result of selective breeding under the supervision of Lyudmila Trut, foxes have become tamer and almost dog-like. This experiment proves that even the wild can be tamed through artificial hampering-- and just how different are we from these foxes, subjected to a bombast of twisted information ready to pull us either to the left or to the right?
Hirakawa draws upon the two foxes to question whether us living in modern society can keep our "wildness" or criticality. He himself believes that many of us have stopped thinking and have come to accept information with docility. In this exhibition, he aims to point this out to the viewer in attempt to reconsider how to deal with media today.