The Art of Mariko Mori The Use of Body as a Subject...

How has the artist used the body as a subject matter to represent issues of identity ad culture in his/her society? Mariko Mori (born in Tokyo in 1967) is considered one of the major young representatives in the contemporary art scene. She worked as a fashion designer before and this inspired many of her later works. Mariko Mori uses her body to explore the instability of identity by presenting herself in glittering, self-designed costumes in extremely out of the world settings, juxtaposing reality and fantasy. She approaches her work in a rather narcissistic way, documenting herself as different images, taking on different identities and roles to convey her intentions in her artworks. Her works is a mixture of culture and technology,†¦show more content†¦The use of vibrant and cool metallic colours give a sense of a world that we are unfamiliar with, possibly the future as these colours contrast with the usual earthly natural tones in our current world. The photographic effect of lighting in the photograph has emphasized the potency of the metallic colours due to the stark contrast betwe en the foreground and the background. Adding on, the character appears to have reached a state of ‘perfection’, getting in touch with her spiritual side. This place may seem to be a world of perfection, a Utopia due to the intensity and calming effect of the colours. Perhaps, Mariko Mori is suggesting that by letting ourselves get in touch with our inner spirit, we would be transcending the boundaries between the spiritual being and the material. Thus, as technology develops, it is expected that we ourselves also develop with it and achieving our perfect state in the future. This again bridges the divide between two separate realms; spiritual and worldly, eastern and western, initial fantasy into reality. Therefore, this comes back to the idea of the instability of identity, that as human beings progress, this will result in the change of social norms and conventional boundaries of who, what we are. The symmetry and balance in the photograph not only brings focus to the 3 replicated fairies in the middle but also