Kenji Yanobe’s Massive Art Installation with Cosmic Cats Takes Flight in GINZA SIX Atrium

“BIG CAT BANG,” a large-scale artwork by Kenji Yanobe, will be exhibited at GINZA SIX in Ginza, Tokyo, from April 5 (Fri.).

Yanobe is a contemporary artist known for his mechanical sculptures and giant sculptures that combine a social message with uniqueness, and this is a new work from his “Ship’s Cat” series, in which he depicts the central atrium of GINZA SIX as a galaxy that includes the Earth, with countless space cats soaring through the air. The floating spaceships are “Sunshine of the Sun” and “Sunshine of the Sky”. The floating spaceship is a tribute to “Tower of the Sun,” and the Taro Okamoto Memorial Museum of Art cooperated with the exhibition. Yanobe, who grew up in Ibaraki, Osaka, and whose childhood experience of the Tower of the Sun towering over the abandoned World Expo was the starting point for his creations, weaves the dynamism of the universe from the Big Bang to the present as a new story of life.

Life was born on this earth 3.5 billion years ago, and we have survived five mass extinctions. Where did life come from and where is it going?

The theme of “Art is an Explosion,” as Taro Okamoto put it, is carried in the delusion of the “Great Cat Explosion,” and we would like to present an explosion of imagination about the mysteries of life and the universe.

It is precisely because we stand in a century of chaos and crisis that we must explode our imagination and creativity and gain a bird’s eye view from the universe.

Artist’s Message (Thoughts on the work)

“BIG CAT BANG” will be on display until the summer of 2025. The museum will also exhibit sculptures from the “Ship’s Cat” series and a 1/50 scale prototype of the “Tower of the Sun,” and from April 5 (Fri.) to 14 (Sun.), space cat goods and the “BIG CAT BANG” making-of book will be on sale in advance.