Summary
- POP MART’s “MONSTERS BY MONSTERS: NOW AND THEN” opens at Azabudai Hills Gallery in Tokyo on June 11, running through July 5
- The exhibition spans eight immersive areas including a world-premiere installation of “The Story of Puca,” rendered across five projection panels with three-dimensional surround sound, alongside original artwork, art toy displays, and a mirror room
- The Tokyo stop marks the final destination of a global tour that began in Shanghai before travelling through Taipei, Hong Kong, and Paris, and will feature exclusive 10th anniversary merchandise available via lottery and first-come-first-served purchase
Labubu has come a long way from a limited-edition picture book. Kasing Lung‘s THE MONSTERS began in 2015 as a trilogy published in only a few hundred copies, a quietly radical piece of illustrated world-building rooted in Nordic folklore and European fairy tale tradition. A decade later, POP MART is bringing the 10th anniversary exhibition “MONSTERS BY MONSTERS: NOW AND THEN” to Tokyo’s Azabudai Hills Gallery, opening June 11 through July 5. The show arrives as the final stop on a global tour that has already passed through Shanghai, Taipei, Hong Kong, and Paris, and brings with it the most complete public presentation of Kasing Lung’s creative world to date.
Understanding the exhibition requires understanding Kasing Lung’s origin story, because the show is as much about the artist’s journey as it is about the characters he created. Born in Hong Kong, Lung moved to the Netherlands as a child, where learning Dutch through picture books sparked a lifelong obsession with illustrated storytelling and the fairy tale traditions of northern Europe. That immersion in European folklore became the conceptual foundation for THE MONSTERS, a universe populated by creatures drawn from Nordic mythology and reimagined through Lung’s distinctive visual language. In 2003, his picture book Oki won first place at a European picture book contest, making him the first Chinese-heritage artist to receive that recognition. By 2011, he had partnered with Hong Kong designer toy brand HOW2WORK to begin releasing art toys, and in 2015 THE MONSTERS trilogy established the full narrative and visual framework that Labubu and its companions inhabit.
The Tokyo exhibition organizes that ten-year arc across eight immersive areas, each one addressing a different dimension of Lung’s creative world. The centrepiece is “The Story of Puca,” a world-premiere installation that brings the first chapter of THE MONSTERS TRILOGY to life across five projection panels with three-dimensional surround sound, produced by toito. The original picture book was published in a limited run of only a few hundred copies, making this immersive adaptation the first opportunity most visitors will ever have to experience that material in any form. The rarity of the source text gives the installation a significance that goes beyond spectacle: it is, in the most literal sense, a world that has never been publicly accessible before.
The remaining seven areas cover the full breadth of Lung’s output and the collaborative history he has built over the decade. The Art Toy Zone traces the evolution of Labubu from its original figure through to the present day’s most recent collaboration pieces, presenting the character’s visual development as a design history. The Painting and Sculpture Zone showcases Lung’s oil paintings and three-dimensional works, reflecting his recent shift toward fine art as a primary creative medium. The Mirror Room constructs an infinite visual universe from THE MONSTERS series collection, using reflection to create a spatial experience of the world’s scale. The Plush House fills a fairy-tale cottage with Labubu plush figures produced in collaboration with POP MART, creating the exhibition’s most photogenic environment. “Pato and the Girl” invites visitors to engage with the trilogy’s second chapter and its central theme of love, while the Creative Journey and Sketch Zone presents Lung and HOW2WORK’s ten-year timeline in a format that rewards close reading. Original artwork, including pieces drawn specifically for the Tokyo exhibition, will be unveiled publicly for the first time.
The merchandise program extends the exhibition’s collector logic into tangible objects. A 10th anniversary figure set is available by lottery to ticket holders, while anniversary accessories and a tote bag set are available via separate lottery and first-come-first-served purchase at the venue. A dedicated POP MART Azabudai Hills Pop Up on the building’s B1 floor runs concurrently with the exhibition, offering broader access to anniversary merchandise and POP MART’s popular IP lineup without requiring an exhibition ticket.
The Tokyo stop carries additional weight as the tour’s final destination. Each previous city added its own cultural context to the show, but Tokyo brings a specific significance: Japan has been central to Kasing Lung’s exhibition history, with solo shows in the city preceding the global expansion of Labubu as a cultural object. The Azabudai Hills Gallery, one of Tokyo’s most architecturally significant contemporary exhibition spaces, provides a setting that matches the ambition of the show’s content.
“MONSTERS BY MONSTERS: NOW AND THEN” opens June 11 and runs through July 5.
Azabudai Hills Gallery
Garden Plaza A MB Floor
Toranomon, Minato-ku
Tokyo
