Takashi Murakami (b.1962) threw the first pitch at Dodgers Stadium in LA last week to celebrate Japanese Heritage Night. Three of the Dodgers’ players are from Japan, where they are considered superstars.
Also popular are Takashi Murakami’s Dodgers jackets and t-shirts. The last collaboration between Morakami and the Dodgers was a limited edition of merch that sold out quickly. This year there are more to go around.
Much of Murakami’s Superflat work is joyful and colorful...the equivalent of Pop Art, blurring the lines between art and commerce, though his subject matter often reflects his interpretation of serious historical events and their ramifications.
Murakami has studios in both Tokyo and New York and has been extremely supportive of the many artists who work with him.
The Cleveland Museum of Art will present Takashi Murakami: Stepping on the Tail of a Rainbow from May 25 through September 27, 2025.
The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville just celebrated the 50th anniversary of Thomas Hart Benton’s Sources of Country Music mural.
Though he is best known for his paintings and murals, Benton was a huge fan of folk and country music and learned songs as he traveled around the country on his sketching expeditions.
Benton learned to play the harmonica when he was in his forties. He even invented a new form of musical notation specifically for the harmonica, which is still used today. Rather than reading from a music score, Benton’s notation uses numbers and arrows to show the player which hole to blow into and whether to blow in or out.
The Benton home was a place where friends listened to and played along. Benton’s son, Thomas Piacenza Benton (1926-2010), nicknamed T.P., studied and played the flute and became the first flutist for the Orlando Symphony Orchestra.
In 1942, Decca Records released a recording called Saturday Night at Tom Benton’s, on which T.P. plays with the American Chamber Music Group, his father on harmonica, Edward Robinson on harpsichord, and the Frank Luther Singers.
Benton’s daughter, Jessie (1939-2023), sang Elizabethan folk songs in a segment about her father on NBC’s Wide Wide World TV program in 1957. In 1959, she played guitar and sang on Edward R. Murrow’s Person to Person interview with her father.
Benton’s most famous student, Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), served as a model in Benton’s murals…playing harmonica.
Please contact us if you would like more information about the works of Takashi Murakami and Thomas Hart Benton available at Surovek Gallery.
References:
Ben Verbrugge. How to Buy Takashi Murakami Los Angeles Dodgers Gear. Newsweek. April 29, 2025.
Justin Wolff. The Ballad of Thomas Hart Benton. National Endowment for the Humanities. September/October 2007, Volume 28, Number 5.
Vineyard Gazette. Painter and Author, in His Spare Time Thomas Benton Transposes Difficult Music to Play on His Harmonica. July 16, 1937.
