DRESS-UP: SELF-FASHIONING AND PERFORMANCE IN THE WORK OF YASUMASA MORIMURA Charles Exley Since his debut in the middle of the 1980s, Yasumasa Morimura has amused audiences worldwide with his examination of famous figures in art history, actresses from the silver screen and iconic photographs of the twentieth century, all through the genre of self-portraiture. e Andy Warhol Museum’s exhibition, Yasumasa Morimura, eater of the Self brings together the many facets of his work. e exhibition offers an ideal forum to consider and reconsider, the ways in which Morimura’s work makes the familiar strange, oen with humorous results, and sets the stage for an interesting examination of self-portraiture that investigates art history while parodying established conventions and exploring the limits of what might be called the aesthetics of impersonation. I dress, therefore I am. Ware yosou. Yue ni ware ari. is is the surprisingly apt formulation of Morimura’s artistic project, which has flourished for nearly thirty years. If his project calls to mind another famous formulation of identity by René Descartes, considered to be fundamental to the modern conception of the self, it should. Unlike Descartes’ solipsistic proof of existence demonstrated by consciousness, Morimura’s project expresses an interest from the outset in the other, in other things, in finding himself in others. It is thus more social, more focused on the world. It draws on a sense of identity that is not single and fixed, as in the Cartesian model, but rather multiple, open-ended, infinite in potential. Whereas cognition is the foundation of Descartes’ description of his own identity, dressing is the foundation of Morimura’s own identity and a useful key to reading his work. Without denying the close relationship to postmodern identity, including politics, sexual identity, gender performance and race—all of which are appropriate to situating Morimura in contemporary, critical context—I will focus here on a 8 ISBN 978-0-9855350-3-2 Yasumasa Morimura: eater of the Self © 2013 e Andy Warhol Museum, Pittsburgh, a museum of Carnegie Institute. All rights reserved.