Style combination · Pairs well

Superflat × Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

Murakami traces Superflat's flatness back to Hokusai's prints; borrow the woodblock keyline, the stylised wave and the cropped composition and fill them with Superflat's saturated characters.

From the research on Superflat

Mix them and make something Superflat Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Superflat, their arrangement from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints, the finish from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Superflat Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

Type from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints: Brush & pen calligraphy
Rotated & vertical setting
Colour from Superflat: Full polychrome
Flat fields
Form from Superflat: Stylised figuration
Distortion & exaggeration
Composition from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints: Dynamic asymmetry
Diagonal axis
Surface from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints: Carved line
Paper & letterpress bite

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

Pop

Shippori Mincho, standing in for Brush-written kana and kanji titles (gyōsho and sōsho hands)

Text · Superflat

The flat, saturated, cartoon-crowded look that Takashi Murakami named in his exhibition and manifesto Superflat (Tokyo, 2000; US tour 2001). It draws a line from Edo painting and prints to postwar anime and manga, and flattens high and low, art and merchandise into one plane. Smiling flowers, many-eyed characters and anime figures come in unshaded polychrome, smooth and glossy, cute and grotesque at once, sold as handbags and album covers as well as paintings. This entry follows the drawn core of Murakami and his Kaikai Kiki circle; the shows also held photography, video and sculpture.

Zen Maru Gothic; Superflat used Letters drawn into the character and Many-coloured repeated monogram

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Superflat, with a counter-accent from Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Superflat Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

#fbfaf5 ground · 36%
#1a1a1a ink · 14%
#ffd900 accent · 18%
#c64a2d accent · 14%
#00a0e9 accent · 10%
#d4a64a accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #fbfaf5;
  --ink: #1a1a1a;
  --accent-1: #ffd900;
  --accent-2: #c64a2d;
  --accent-3: #00a0e9;
  --accent-4: #d4a64a;
  --font-display: "Shippori Mincho", serif;
  --font-text: "Zen Maru Gothic", sans-serif;
}

Use it with care

Superflat: Some canonical works use explicit otaku sexual imagery, such as Murakami's My Lonesome Cowboy (1998), and associated artists engage with lolicon art: Mr. describes himself as a lolicon and Henmaru Machino parodies it; never sexualise childlike figures. The mushroom-cloud skulls of Murakami's Time Bokan works and the title Little Boy, the name of the Hiroshima bomb, refer to the atomic bombings, and critics such as Dong-Yeon Koh argue that this victim narrative obscures Japanese aggression in China and Korea; do not use mushroom clouds or skulls as cute decoration. Handle borrowed Buddhist iconography and phrases, such as Kannon, with respect, and draw original characters and flowers: Mr. DOB, the smiling flowers and the Louis Vuitton monogram are owned designs.

The two styles

A densely packed, brightly coloured cartoon poster reads “HAPPYVERSE” above a smiling blue-haired character with extra eyes on their forehead, hair and outstretched palms. Smiling flowers, winged rabbits, floating creatures, stars and planets surround the character, with a smiling Earth at the bottom.

1993–present · East Asia, Global / networked Superflat The flat, saturated, cartoon-crowded look that Takashi Murakami named in his exhibition and manifesto Superflat (Tokyo, 2000; US tour 2001). It draws a line from Edo painting and prints to postwar anime and manga, and flattens high and low, art and merchandise into one plane. Smiling flowers, many-eyed characters and anime figures come in unshaded polychrome, smooth and glossy, cute and grotesque at once, sold as handbags and album covers as well as paintings. This entry follows the drawn core of Murakami and his Kaikai Kiki circle; the shows also held photography, video and sculpture.

An enormous hawk with raised wings and extended talons swoops over a rough sea with a small sailboat and rocky islands. Pine-covered cliffs and a Japanese-style building frame the right side, with a mountain, red sun and vertical Japanese lettering in the background.

1670–1900 · East Asia Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints Mass-produced Edo-period woodblock prints of actors, courtesans, legends and landscapes, designed by an artist, cut and printed by specialist craftsmen and sold cheaply by commercial publishers. Flat colour blocks inside a carved keyline, bold cropping, high or oblique viewpoints and diagonal compositions, with titles in small cartouches, later handed Europe a new model for the poster.

More combinations

With Superflat

All 18 combinations with Superflat

With Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

All 15 combinations with Ukiyo-e Woodblock Prints

Every style combination