Yukinori Yanagi

Yukinori Yanagi (柳幸典, Yanagi Yukinori, born 1959) is a contemporary Japanese artist.

Yukinori Yanagi is a contemporary Japanese artist who has addressed themes of national and transnational sovereignty, globalization and borders, as well as Japan’s imperial history and nationalism. He is considered one of the first postwar Japanese artists that is openly critical of Japanese society and governmental policy. Many of Yanagi’s artworks consists of large-scale, site-specific installations that engage with movement and symbols of nationalism.

Yanagi has exhibited his artworks widely in Japan and the United States, and became among the first foreign artists living in New York to be invited to exhibit at the Whitney Biennial, alongside Cai Guo-Qiang, in 2000. His artworks are in museum collections such as the Museum of Modern Art (USA), Tate Modern (UK), Virginia Museum of Fine Art (USA) and the Fabric Workshop and Museum (USA). His vision for the revitalization of the island of Inujima was actualized as the Inujima Seirensho Art Museum in 2008, a permanent, six-part art installation that has become an integral location of the Setouchi International Art Triennale.