Photo: Hiro Yamagata
Hiro Yamagata creates artworks that are simultaneously high tech and elemental, theoretical and visceral, abstract and immersive. He explores the links between science and art, micro and macro phenomenon, and geography, ecology, technology and cultural memory.
His most recent endeavor, planned for completion in 2009, will create 160 – 240 images of Buddhas on the site of the once enormous Bamiyan Buddhas, which were destroyed by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Over 140 laser systems installed 500m, 1km and 5km in distance from the Bamiyan hills will project multiple layers of original drawings in striking colors. The laser images will be projected for 2 hours after sunset, once or twice a week. The laser systems built specifically for this installation will shoot long range green beams and short range multiple color beams, designed to create a striking contrast to the purplish red hue of the Bamiyan sunset and the black mountain shadows. The energy used by the laser systems will be produced by environmentally friendly windmills and solar power plants. The power produced is also meant to provide light and electricity for the people of Bamiyan.
Yamagata’s other projects include his 2001 installation at the at the Guggenheim Museum in Balboa Spain, a changing exhibition comprised of laser technologies and refractive surfaces, and his 1998 public exhibition in Los Angeles when he "flooded" over one mile of the Los Angeles River with monumentally scaled laser lights. For his earlier Yokohama project, co-hosted by NASA, a pair of 20-metre cubes covered with holographic panels refracting beams of sunlight showered colored rays over surrounding buildings to create a mesmerizing, dematerializing effect.
Hiro Yamagata was born in Japan in 1948, and studied at L’Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, where he befriended members of the Beat Generation including Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso. He moved to Los Angeles in 1978 where he continues to live and work. Yamagata’s ongoing exploration of immersive environments is perhaps best represented by the artist’s studio, or "laboratory," which is a permanent, yet constantly changing installation.
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Hiro Yamagata |
Hiro Yamagata |
Hiro Yamagata |
Hiro Yamagata |
Hiro Yamagata |
Symposium C6 runs concurrent with 