Mariko Mori

Mariko Mori (森 万里 子, Mori Mariko, born 1967 in Tokyo, Japan) is a multimedia artist.

Mori studied Bunka Fashion College in Tokyo on and works as a designer, photographer, artist and model. She moved to London in 1988 and studied at the Byam Shaw School of Art and at Chelsea College of Art and Design. 1992/1993 was followed by a participation in the Independent Study Program of the Whitney Museum of American Art Mariko Mori lives and works in New York and Tokyo.

Mori staged mostly even with unnatural contact lenses, extreme outfits, costumes and make-up in her photographs and video works. In the early 1990s she began with a series of photographs in which she parodied video games or quoted Japanese anime and manga, where she stylized herself as a cyborg character or aliens. Here she deals with the rigid traditional Japanese woman image; caricaturing it with computerized Geisha figures and replaced it critical of society through their own fantasy figures. Mariko Mori can be counted artistically into a " granddaughter " of pop art.

Works (selection)

• Play with Me
• Tea Ceremony
• Love Hotel
• Red Light
• Subway
• Empty Dream ( 1995)