Boris Hoppek

http://www.borishoppek.de/

https://www.instagram.com/borishoppek3/

Boris Hoppek was born in 1970 in Kreuztal, a little village in Germany. 

Hoppek’s artistic career started 20 years ago with a wall and a spray can. But while his artistic roots lie in graffiti, his work today is as multifaceted as his message is unsettling. He works with anything from large-scale installations to tiny drawings, takes photos, makes videos and has even created a magazine. At first glance, his works look innocent, even cute. Well, look again. Hoppek tells radical tales of racism, violence, sex and misogyny and confronts his audience with their own prejudices, frequently pushing them out of their comfort zone. Don’t expect the cuddly to be lovable. 

Hoppek has shown his work in streets and galleries all over the world. Only in 2009, he had three solo exhibitions ? in Barcelona, Hamburg and Paris ? and participated in several group shows, amongst them the True Self exhibition at the Jonathan LeVine gallery in NYC, curated by Gary Baseman, and the Apocalypse Wow! show at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Rome, where he was also invited to create a site-specific work. Hoppek’s trademark are his characters, drawn with few but strong lines. They (and he) were the face of the 2009 edition of Pictoplasma, the renowned character design festival in Berlin. On the basis of his Bimbo dolls, he was asked to create another series of dolls, the C’Mons, for a Europe-wide advertising campaign for the Opel Corsa car, which has been running from 2006 until today. 

Boris Hoppek has published three books of his work, and has been included in numerous books on street and neo-pop art. His work has also been featured in a multitude of magazines and newspapers, including the current editions of IdN, Elephant and Nico.

Kimiko Mitani Woo / MW Company

http://www.mw-company.com/

Independent Art Curator / Art Producer.

After a career at Wieden + Kennedy Tokyo as an account executive of Nike, Kimiko Mitani Woo follows her dreams working with “Asian art and design”. Having worked on a few art projects such as Akasaka Art Flower 08, the artist management for Nam June Paik Art Center Opening, she established MW Company in February 2009 and started working in art producing in Tokyo and Shanghai. The main role of the company is to expose young and upcoming artists who represent a unique and non-traditional perspective of the world. By doing so, MW Company provides and encourages opportunities and development of the East Asian art scene. 

The previous projects are: the curation for DIESEL DENIM GALLERY AOYAMA 2009 and GYRE ART WINDOW, guest curation of JENKINS at CCC in Shizuoka, PR for CREAM YOKOHAMA International Festival for Arts and Media 2009. Currently, she has been preparing for upcoming Shanghai project.