INDEX
Style influenced by hip-hop
Takano: Has this been your style since you were in art school?
ARUMANA: In the beginning, I painted with oils, but I started using a PC when I was in my second year of college. At that time, my style was a little more art-oriented, sampling old classical paintings in the context of art, rather than the way it is now. However, this humanoid dog by DENKI GROOVE can be found at …….
Celeina: Human face dog (laughs).
ARUMANA: This commission came to me about a little after I graduated from college. I remixed it with a drawing I had done myself at the time, and changed the faces to Taki-san and Takkyu-san. I drew them as if they were Leonardo da Vinci.
Takano: You mentioned the words “sampling” and “remix” earlier. It seems to have a musical or hip-hop feel to it.
Celeina: What kind of culture has influenced you?
ARUMANA: It’s hip-hop, as you can see on this T-shirt.
Celeina: Did you get into hip-pop from music? Or from fashion?
ARUMANA: From music. I first listened to Japanese rap, and from there I started digging old works and listening to US hip-hop. I found the culture of sampling and mashups interesting, and I began to use them often in my own expression.
Takano: Speaking of mash-ups, the posts on social networking sites are really edgy. For example, “Hammer x Kammer,” in which Hollywood Zakoshisho is drawn in the style of the cover of “HUNTER x HUNTER. That was quite a buzz, wasn’t it?
ARUMANA: That one got a lot of buzz. The first post got about 100,000 likes.
Takano: Then there was “AKIRA” × Pierre Taki, “TAKIRA.
Takano: Where did you get this idea?
ARUMANA: It’s a pun. I often start with a word, imagine how it would be interesting to visualize it, and then create a picture. It depends on the object.
