HELLO BOOBS( British Museum, Oct 2025 | Duration: 2 hr )
In October 2025, Hello Boobs (origin figure hello kitty obviously) staged a virtual protest at the British Museum. Through the erotic re-creation of a classic kawaii icon, I attempt to ask: Who decides when, where, and in what form our breasts — and our bodies — may appear?
By reimagining Hello Kitty, I try to reclaim the agency and voice of the East Asian female body. Giving her abstract breasts becomes a gesture of provocation — transforming sweetness into discomfort, and cuteness into complexity. I pose a series of questions:
Why normally can’t cuteness coexist with sexuality?
Does the kawaii automatically lose its purity / virtue when it is sexualized?
Why are cuteness and desire only allowed to coexist within male-oriented, pedophilic fantasies of Asian erotic animation?
Why does a kawaii figure with sexual organs make people uncomfortable?
In front of different male gaze oriented art masterpieces, Hello boobs stands silently, with her ink-painted abstract breasts.
Confronting the visitors behind, in front, or even through it, also the and the canonized image of womanhood — as a quiet, 'Oriental' form of protest, a speechless response to the male gaze that continues to shape both art history and the society nowadays.
Oct 2025
All copyright of Hello Kitty belongs to Sanrio. This artwork is an independent artistic re-creation. If there is any infringement, it will be removed.