Manga Cannibalism Sparks Censorship Fury in Japan

An exhibition of paintings showing cannibalism and dismemberment is stirring a debate on art censorship in Japan, the home of violent manga comics.

Aida Makotos work at Tokyos Mori Art Museum last night provoked protests from a Japanese organization called People Against Pornography and Sexual Violence.

The group wrote to museum director Nanjo Fumio demanding that the images be removed because the museum was showing sexual, misogynistic material.

Its not so bad compared to manga and anime on the Internet, Nanjo said in an interview. This artists vision is about our society, which is hidden and (which) often people dont look at. The disturbing works encourage the viewer to question violence in all its forms, not to celebrate it, he said.

Makotos Monument for Nothing career retrospective includes pictures of Japanese retirees playing croquet with severed heads, a suicide device designed to always fail, a giant blender full of naked women and a kamikaze attack on New York (painted before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001).

Hidden behind a black curtain is a section restricted to people of 18 years old or more, where Makoto, 47, shows images of dismembered women and of a multi headed monster having sex. The latter echoes a 19th-century print by Hokusai.

Unlike the easily recognizable output of Takashi Murakami or Yayoi Kusama, Makotos oeuvre contains so many different styles that its impossible to label him.

He draws inspiration from comic books, prostitution advertisements, the Marquis de Sade, and Yukio Mishima, the Japanese writer who committed ritual seppuku (suicide by disembowelment) in 1970.

One painting shows a farmer in traditional Japanese costume harvesting Louis Vuitton bags from a muddy field. A Bonsai sculpture has smiling heads in place of cherry blossoms, poking fun at the countrys Kawaii culture of cuteness.

A folding screen depicts crows, some with human remains in their beaks, perched on electric power poles positioned at dangerous angles -- a post-apocalyptic tableau recalling a 16th- century work by Hasegawa Tohaku.

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Manga Cannibalism Sparks Censorship Fury in Japan