That's not a joke!: “Flower Matango"

A small post about some scandalous practices in Versaille has to appear in our blog))) So, just a few words and a few pictures (not our own, because D&P haven't succedeed yet in visiting this exhibition and yesterday Paris was blocked by RER strikes, we have plenty of excuses...)) Cheerful Japanese artist Takashi or Takeshi or Takasi Murakami who had once transformed strict Louis Vuitton bags and made them funny at LV creative director Marc Jacobs request. Takashi didn't stop on bags. He took up something very dear to French hearts - Versaille palace.
French people are furious, of course. But that's rather from force of habit, Murakami’s strange creations are just about the last thing you'd expect to see in the Hall of Mirrors, but they are still amazing.
Murakami brought to Versaille two oversized, tendril-sprouting globes covered with cartoonish grinning flowers in eye-popping pinks, greens and yellows (as I understood these flowers gave the name to the exhibition) and dozens of other monumental sculptures. There are sculptures of different sizes: some of them are really huge and they seem huge even in the spacious interiors of the Versaille Palace. The interesting thing that I realized is that Murakami sculptures were placed in the halls of the palace very precisely: the sculpture by Takashi was always
situated near the ancient sculpture or picture of the same size.
So in spite of the enormous difference between the charged Baroque style and that of Japanese comic books, or mangas we can feel that items of the both styles are a bit alike.
I have heard a lot about a storm of criticism from French people who denounced the idea of Takashi’s exhibition in the palace interiors. They also said that “Flower Matango” should be exhibited in the museum Pompidou or somewhere like this. But it seems to me that Versaille is a perfect place for “Flower Matango”, unexpected palace interiors make funny sculptures looking like a real art. Takashi remind us that his sculptures are not only amusing items but harmonious compositions.
And he is right: his flowers are the harmony of proportions and this harmony makes us think about the elegance of ancient chandeliers and so on.

To cut a long story short, French citizens rail for nothing. Murakami made them smile and that's cool (he who has stood in a queue at least once will understand).