Simon Fujiwara Who is Little Red Riding Hood and Who is the Big Bad Wolf?, 2026

Who is Little Red Riding Hood and Who is the Big Bad Wolf?, executed in acrylic, charcoal and pastel on canvas, depicts the fairy tale’s pair re-formed. In the upper part of the composition, Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf hold hands; the traditional stage for their conflict has all but dissolved. The girl appears in a red cloak, the wolf drawn beside her as a companion presence rather than an opposing force, tipping the familiar roles into a different kind of closeness. The heroine appears in Charles Perrault’s 1697 tale and the Brothers Grimm’s 1812 version, meeting a wolf on the way to her grandmother’s house. In the best-known retellings, the encounter turns predatory. Here, joined by touch, that central opposition is displaced.