Takeshi Murata I Popeye

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Takeshi Murata, an American artist born in the 1970s, specializes in digital media art and is best known for his video art and animation. His work has been featured in art exhibitions across the country, from New York to California, as well as in Japan and the United Kingdom. One of Murata’s pieces, known as, “I, Popeye”, is a 3-D animated video, created in 2010, that portrays a dark take on the life of the American, cartoon icon, Popeye.

The video begins by displaying, “Popeye, The Sailor in “I, Popeye”, followed by the piece’s credits, in white text, with a sailboat in the background. Despite the dark nature of this piece, an upbeat, folk tune begins playing in the background. Then the film turns black and white as it slowly zooms in on a spinach factory. A 3-D animated, full-color portrayal of Popeye is shown working a conveyor belt, filling cans with spinach (that looks like green goo). Although he does have anchor tattoos on his forearms, a tobacco pipe in his mouth, and is wearing a sailor hat like he did in his original cartoon, Popeye is wearing a black and white shirt, with an image of himself playing poker, and white pants, instead of the his iconic sailor apparel. While working, he falls asleep and slips into a colorful, psychedelic dream world that shows glitchy, video art as well as 3-D animated shapes. Popeye, then, wakes up at his job at the spinach …show more content…

By using the well known cartoon icon, Popeye, who is known by a large majority of people, Murata was able to easily connect to members of his audience. His sad narrative about this cartoon character’s life after his show, also, represented the topic of maturity as well as the fact that life contains bad events, not just good ones. This piece of video art truly makes viewers realize that there is a lot more to Popeye, the infamous, cartoon sailor, than they originally

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