Gallery: Daughter Of Art History

In our age of digital sleight of hand, few artists ply their trade more slyly than Yasumasa Morimura. Inserting his image into famous works, this Osaka-based master becomes the languorous courtesan (and her maid) in Manet’s Olympia or–how could he resist?–the Mona Lisa. Combining photography, painting and computer manipulation, each piece is a wicked homage, turning art history into a gilded vanity mirror. In his new show at New York City’s Luhring Augustine Gallery, the farce is lavish and precise, as Morimura continues his wry, gender-bending ways.

–By Steven Henry Madoff