5-2-4
These paintings merge appropriations from historical works with images from Tanaami’s dreams. The Maze of Snail (cat. 5-4) combines an archival photograph of a boy afflicted with smallpox, holding a medicinal branch, with an iconic bridge frequently depicted by Hokusai. The Dream from a Half Sleep (cat. 5-2) was inspired by a dream of a man resembling a figure from the Italian Renaissance painter Andrea Mantegna’s Lamentation of Christ (c. 1480). Tanaami fleshed out the painting’s imagery based on notes from his dream journal. Meanwhile, The Collector (from the frontpiece of Moses Harris, The Aurelian) (cat. 5-3) was inspired by the frontispiece of The Aurelian, an illustrated guide published in 1776 by the English entomologist and engraver Moses Harris. Tanaami’s work incorporates numerous snails, absent from the original illustration, creating a surreal and thoroughly dreamlike world.