Two Murakamis

When I traveled to San Francisco in August, I fell in love with a painting I saw at one of the galleries. The painting, the image is seen below, was by an artist named Murakami.

Months later, I was impressed when I found out that Murakami is also a well known author and really enjoyed reading one of his books: After Dark. Some people are just multi-talented!

Well, surprise, surprise! Reading New York Times today, I realized that these are actually two different people: the artist is Takashi Murakami and the author is Haruki Murakami; as far as I can tell they are not related. Perhaps Murakami in Japan is the same as Smith is here (hi, Jenny!).