Takeshi Murata

Infinite Doors

If one had been guessing at Takeshi Murata’s criticism of American consumerist culture up until watching Infinite Doors, it would be solidified after hearing the announcer from The Price is Right squawk prizes one after the next. In the two minutes of the film’s runtime, can count the word “new” used twenty-eight times, and “car”—the holy grail of prizes on that show—used eight times. The bodacious women introduce free prizes, the doors slide open repeatedly, and the crowd cheers with an insatiable appetite in a clear signal of an American propensity for numbing overconsumption. (An unexpected moment of humor emerges when a Nazi enthusiast from the ending of Indiana Jones: Raiders of the Lost Ark melts on one of the new, free flat-screen TVs.) The artist talks about this work in relation to his experience as a “child of the ‘80s (mostly),” making him a prime target for that era’s commercial marketing on steroids. Murata says, “The ‘80s-era marketing is comical now, and easy to make look ridiculous. With Infinite Doors, I wanted to show my affinity for it, for better and worse, and understand how it shaped my aesthetic development. With the digital age, it’s harder to see the humor because it’s harder to see. It’s definitely heightened, or maybe honed is a better word. How else are Facebook and Google worth billions, right?”