Black Aiko Lady Butterfly Sculpture
Tomenosuke has revealed the second version of Aiko‘s Lady Butterfly sculpture, and it looks stunning. The premiere silver edition of the figure was released (and promptly sold out) last Valentine’s Day. Fans of Aiko’s street art will immediately recognize the character, who Aiko describes as: “a fairy of the street. She comes in the night and draws stories of love and romance with her spray paint.”
Tomenosuke first contacted Aiko in 2008 after seeing her Bunny toy produced by Kidrobot. In 2009, Aiko designed the packaging for the Tomenosuke Blaster, a replica of the Blade Runner Blaster. The pair then began to discuss how they could make a sculpture based on Aiko’s work. During a trip to Rome, Aiko felt “inspired by all those Baroque sculptures in the museums and everywhere on the street.” She decided to make an “AIKO-meets-Baroque style elegant piece.”
Aiko describes the process on her blog:
The most difficult part was to work with a sculptor and create 3D based on the original silhouette image. It takes time to complete just one sculpture, because it consists of 13 little pieces to be assembled together and most of process such as filing and painting are done by hand. I visited their workshop, tackled everyone on the tiny details; body shape, personality, emotion, background story, color and glitter of the skin, and even the street soul.
She shares pictures of her trip to Hida-Takayama here.
Tomenosuke says that there will be five colorways of the Aiko Lady Butterfly sculpture, each in an ultra-limited edition of ten pieces. The next edition is black with a slight silver lame and will be offered for sale in the middle of September. Each figure stands 10-inches tall and is expected to cost ~$500 USD.
Even the packaging looks really elegant! Alas, for those of us unable to catch this Aiko Lady Butterfly, we can still enjoy the Ladies of the street…
