The very idea of a comprehensive retrospective of Tadanori Yokoo's work is a daunting one. How to bring together an oeuvre that spans almost a half-century and is, by turns, strident, nationalistic, homoerotic, funny and cosmic; that is both representational and abstract; that comprises posters, photographs, paintings, sculpture, installation, and thousands of vintage picture postcards of waterfalls?
Somehow, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo (MoT) has succeeded swimmingly, with "All Things in the Universe."
More than any other Japanese contemporary artist of his generation, Yokoo, 67, is possessed of a constant need to change. He does not evolve his work, rather he plays it out, abandons it and then comes up with something that is completely different. He is a curator's nightmare, but to his followers (I say "followers" because Yokoo is somewhat of an international cult figure), he is a geyser of creative energy.