Tokyo based artist ISO Hirofu / Komainu creates breathtaking art installations triggered by the banal events of everyday life. His creations are dark, seductive and decidedly atmospheric.
For the solo exhibition titled “Nighthopper” ISO Hirofu / Komainu, also known as “Komainu”, attempts to reconstruct events that take place during the dark nights and translate them into artworks. According the artist a boundary can be a contact point as well as a dividing tool. Then, it can also be a place or an event. The main piece of the show, the installation “Days in Nights” has its roots at the boundary and contact point between “day and night”, “city and outer city” and “self and others”. This installation, which embodies his concept, consists of fluorescent lighting fittings placed in star shape on the ceiling. The painted insects are attached to the chains hung from those fittings.
Those insects normally fly under the stars and moonlight at night, being disturbed by artificial light. Although the human lights exist as “undiscovered” for the insects and stay out of their field, it can be taken into their territory in the course of time. As the insects are not familiar with artificial light, human beings who live under daylight cannot exert fully in the darkness of night. ISO Hirofu / Komainu is attracted to the unknown and unconscious part of the world, which can be translated into “night” and pursues his interest like cutting a path through the forest. The exhibition title “Nighthopper” can signify the artist himself and while expanding his territory, the unknown becomes well known and the border between him and the object shifts. This whole event is concentrated in and embodied as his installation work.
Born in 1978 in Tokyo, Hirofu ISO / Komainu, holds a BA (Architecture) and an MA (Inter Media Art) from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music.
