See Virgil Abloh and Takashi Murakami's "Times Nature" at Benilde's Center for Campus Art starting February 10.

Few figures have made such an indelible stamp on luxury fashion as Virgil Abloh and Takashi Murakami. Considering how coveted and controversial Abloh’s Off-White logos are and the mania surrounding Murakami’s imagery for Louis Vuitton, it’s clear the two shared common ground in the power of visual language. 

That Abloh and Murakami came together for art’s sake was inevitable. Through their first show in 2018 at London’s Gagosian, the design duo didn’t just bond over their ability to transform everyday symbolism and caricature into objects of aspiration. By joining their respective rosters and compounding their signature visuals, creating multiverse upon multiverse from them via canvas or sculpture, they demonstrated how accessible such iconography can be.

Certainly, Abloh has demonstrated the immutability of symbolism. Be it repurposing construction site signage or recontextualizing a word by quarantining it in quotation marks, he’s shown how susceptible symbols can be to adaptation, as transferable to a protest placard as to a pricey streetwear tee. 

Murakami himself possesses an oeuvre that strikes as pulp or pedestrian on the surface but speaks volumes. For the artist, a cartoon flower doesn’t just elicit a universal scream of “kawaii” but retraces the conflicting feelings Japanese people still have from the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. 

Through successive shows such as “America Too” at the Gagosian in Beverly Hills, the design dynamos have explored the exponential power of symbolism. Perhaps also that capitalism, if used cleverly, can be one of the most effective tools to convey a message—even dissent. As they’ve exhibited, a graphic as simple as a cube of outward-facing arrows makes it as easy for the public to recognize from a luxury garment as to repurpose for their own agenda, especially if that agenda resonates with a contemporary subculture or rising movement.