Olympia, overhauled. “Yasumasa Morimura has spent decades reimagining historical narratives by transforming himself into iconic art and pop culture images,” wrote Holly Black in Elephant Issue 38. As seen here, the chameleonic Japanese artist’s reinterpretations of well-known artworks are particularly striking, propelled by his conflicted feelings towards the Western canon. “I was born and raised in a non-Western world,” Morimura told Black. “To me, the Western world and its art history feel like a ‘father’ who dominates his family… [I see myself as] ‘a daughter of art history,’ I get pregnant and give birth to artworks as my own children, holding both love and hate towards the father.”
