The most concrete ground on the existence of human beings may be that we occupy a certain space. We rationally know that we are not free from space because we exist within it. It can be said that a space is made up of small materials that cannot be further broken down by current scientific technology, and that the human body is made up of an organic combination of such small materials that occupy their own space. Theoretically, if the unit of the composition of the human body could be transferred to the minimum unit of materials, we might be free from space. However, this is only a theoretical explanation. What kinds of spirits do humans free from space have? The experiences and memories in a person's head do not occupy any space. They only exist in the state of images. They do not have materials that require time and space. Is it impossible then for a spirit to turn into a material? On the contrary, can a material not turn into a spirit?
Hiroshi Kobayashi depicts dolls that freely occupy a space using layers with the same color in pixel form, the minimum unit of a digital image. For this, he takes a photograph with a strong illumination that can maximize the contrast, recombines the images in a computer, and then transforms them into a painting. This can also be explained as a process that materializes an image virtually created by light into layers. The materialized layers reproduce the artist's experiences and memories of his daily life and childhood in the form of dolls that play in a musical-like, dramatic situation. If a spirit and material can be coincided, it would be done through this process, a process in which an image is materialized, and material is re-conceptualized.
Hiroshi Kobayashi, who went through the tsunami and nuclear meltdown that hit Japan in 2011 both directly and indirectly, has agonized over the limits and pain of humans and their weakness in front of nature. While his work process is related with the relationships between reason and emotion, and material and spirit, the contents of his works deal with problems that commonly occur in the relationships between humans and nature, life and everyday life, and desire and power through the history of people. Hiroshi Kobayashi delivers his messages through the casting of various dolls, like a piece from a musical describing the duplicity of humans who feebly fall in front of nature, but challenge and develop nature to overcome it.
Even under a painful situation, humans imagine pleasant things or sing joyfully while smiling to forget their pain. In such a situation, we feel all kinds of emotions, such as joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness, and produce emotional grounds to understand others. We learn that even in a difficult situation, there are people whom we can depend upon, and how to trust in them. Hiroshi Kobayashi tells us to keep on singing the song of hope
His work, "Emergency Evacuation" shows dolls that run around in full tension and confusion after the Japanese earthquake. The moment is a desperate one in which people can even die, but Hiroshi Kobayashi also adds humor and a unique spatial feeling to the work. The gestures of his dolls lead the viewer to imagine their next movements, and both the props and his dolls' gestures make the viewer calmly pay attention to the message of their creator, Hiroshi Kobayashi.
Hiroshi Kobayashi's dolls look still in the air, but actually present a certain directivity and great movement. They drift in the air with a movement within their stillness, but each doll gives a feeling of a dramatic movement, like a still image from the scene of a musical. Their dramatic movement even makes me want to dance to the music they play.
- Dae-sik Yim, Curator
