Cartoons are a genre no longer confined to the realm of children’s entertainment. Its ability to relate to all ages and remain timeless throughout history and contemporary culture is often overlooked. American artist KAWS, taps into this medium by parodying characters from popular cartoons with his distinct artistic aesthetic. The artist draws from the comforting familiarity associated with popular cartoon characters, but also abstracts and reworks them with warped perspectives and frenzied outlines to elicit complex emotional responses from his viewers.

With ‘X’s for eyes that conventionally represent death in cartoon culture, the present lot shows KAWS utilising his signature motif onto a familiar comic strip beagle character. Well-known for his clean visual imagery, KAWS’s lack of visible brushstrokes and use of a minimalist monochrome palette maintain a graphic quality to the work— stripping the figurative into an abstract surface that directly confronts its viewers. The viewer recognises the lovable beagle character, but its crossed-out eyes and agitated lines assign an entirely new personality to the original cartoon. The repetitive effect from the multiplication of the figure conveys a sense of insecurity— as if the character is attempting to assert its presence by echoing itself.

Using accessible characters as his main subjects, KAWS opens up the realm of art not only to art critics and intellectuals, but also to a mass audience through popular culture.