Takahiro Komuro

Komuro trained at the Sculpture Department of Tokyo University of the Arts up to an MFA level. He has since founded TkoM Factory inc. where he currently produces his brightly coloured gloss sculptures. From small vinyl toys to large life-sized creations, Komuro’s sculptures blur the boundaries between fine art and design, and balance fantasy with horror. Embracing childhood fantasies, his sculptures inspire a feeling of nostalgia and unease all at once. Growing up in the late 1980s and 1990s, a wide range of cultural influences formed the basis of his practice, from sci-fi films like Jurassic Park, Star Wars, and E.T., up to Transformers toys and the design of the Nintendo Family Computer. 

For his solo exhibition ‘Phantom Cave’, Komuro was inspired by the space of our gallery, its length and brick walls, which he reimagines as a cave where his sculptures come to life. However, this is not a simple cave, but a phantom cave, meaning that it exists somewhere between reality and fiction, inviting the audience to enter with their imagination and allow themselves to experience the surreal vision of the artist.

“I am interested in the expression between reality and fiction, so I composed the exhibition based on the image of a phantom cave that appears in London for a limited time only.” – Takahiro Komuro

At the entrance of the Phantom Cave, mysterious egg-shelled creatures called Egg Yolkies appear in groups. The figure itself, with no torso, but arms and legs growing directly from its head, is reminiscent of the first human drawings of children, expressing ‘cuteness’ with a minimum of elements. The egg also signifies the birth of life, the child, the future, and hope. It represents the energy to break through the eggshell and live strongly. 

Following is his bronze sculpture Crystal Prison, which recalls the story of a robot that has escaped from a forced labor camp for robots far out in the universe. By creating a toy robot out of bronze, a traditional material in sculpture, the artist attempts to redefine the Japanese toy genre of Chogokin* in the context of sculpture. 

Moving further into Phantom Cave we come across more of his fantastic creatures, from his sculpture dragon series to his skeletal skull bats, and a series of mountains suspended in the air, conceived from Takahiro’s surreal vision of a flying volcano. Orks and Cyclops complete the world of Komuro that has transformed the space of StolenSpace Gallery into a melting pot of fantastical, brightly-coloured figures that reside somewhere between reality and fiction. 

*“Chogokin” (超合金) is a Japanese term which means “Super Alloy”. It was originally the name of a fictitious material used to construct the super robot “Mazinger Z” which appeared in a Japanese comics and animations series back in the 1970s.