Host: Thank you! Now, do any young artists or creators have a question?

B－：I’m a part time lecturer. Thank you for speaking today. I was wondering what kind of artists will be in demand in the future.
Maybe it’s because my background is in design, but when I’m interacting with students, I think about how there are a lot of teachers, including myself, that feel like art is something that is displayed in a museum and makes money when it’s bought by a rich person from overseas. Or, you can’t become successful without luck. I can’t even imagine what I should say to my future students if they ask, so I was wondering if you could advise me. I would also like to know who your favorite artist is.

福田： I think there are two types of artists, the Takashi Murakami type and the Yoshitomo Nara type. Andy Warhol and Murakami are both examples of artists who know how to market their work. Nara, on the other hand, is more like an artist from the old days. The difference is whether or not they can discuss money. Unfortunately, Japanese art education has always been considered to be about enduring poverty for your craft. I think Murakami wrote about that in his book Geijutsutosoron (Artistic Struggle Theory) (Gentosha Bunko). Art has always been viewed as something with no real-world function, so if you keep working at it despite being poor, maybe you’ll sell something eventually. But, as I mentioned, there’s a worldwide market of 7 trillion yen. In times like these, there’s no need for an artist to settle for being poor. Instead of working on art to get rich, we need a societal structure in place that places value on the societal merit of a creation, and I think that’s something we can accomplish, even in Japan.
This isn’t because there aren’t enough people with money in Japan, it’s because there aren’t enough people who know how to market their work.
I think we should teach more classes on how artists and clients should talk about money and prices. It’s the same in my job. For example, let’s say I set a monthly consulting fee of 1 million yen and the customer says, “no, please do it for 800,000”. I can’t simply drop the price to get the customer. I am not in a line of work where the price is set based on how much it is to make and ship a product. I take pride in doing business where the value is that only I can do it. I think that is similar to art. If you lose 1 yen then you decrease your own value by 1 yen. So, you can’t afford to accept even a 1 yen price cut. Otherwise, you shouldn’t do it at all.
So, I thank them for their interest in my services and let them know that it can’t be done for the price they are asking. That is the revolution. When all creators can refuse like this, the world will quickly change. In Canada, New York and Australia, this has already happened. A web designer in Australia makes an average of around 15 million yen per year. Japanese designers have the lowest annual income in the whole of the developed world, earning 3.6 million yen in 2018. Which is to say, if we don’t change our social structure, it will be difficult to change the way we think in terms of your question.
As for my favorite artist, it isn’t about like or dislike because for me art production is always a business, so I see it from that perspective. When I find an unknown in a gallery on the edge of town, I think, “I want to make this person famous across the world”. In Japan, Sebastian Masuda was originally not considered part of the art world because he was the art director for Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. However, I happened to see his solo exhibition in New York, and I wanted to bring him into the art world, so I contacted him and gave a presentation to the owner of POLA, Satoshi Suzuki. I received his backing, and we did massive exhibitions inspired by Monet at the POLA Museum of Art in Hakone and its annex in Ginza.
That’s why I do what I do. I like to bring people who are doing commercial design to the side of pure art, then produce them with the power of a client. So, rather than liking a particular artist, I think my strength lies in bringing as much as possible to society, cities, companies and corporations, in situations where there is no growth without art. Does that answer your question?

Host:Thank you very much.