Hiroyuki Hamada is an acclaimed sculptor whose work has been exhibited widely in prominent galleries, and whose practice has secured him notable grants including the Guggenheim Fellowship in 2018. Hamada’s success has not managed to subdue his art’s disruptive intentions. Starting as a painter, Hamada progressively escaped the canvas’ flat surface, creating generally black and white, rounded structures suggestive of nature—whose seeming fluidity resist discursive interpretations of the dominant art world.
His works invite reflection of a different kind. Hamada creates organically, as if letting something communicate through him. He searches for a precise and indescribable moment in art where form begins to communicate beyond language; a universal force which conveys a subversive message to the viewer, unrestrained by social imperatives.
Hamada’s sculptural practice may appear as an entirely distinct expression from his uncensored opinions and activist nature, yet both of these outlets are a form of searching for evidential truths. We invited Hiroyuki Hamada for a conversation to reflect on his belief in art’s role as an unhindered driving force. The artist spoke to Collecteurs about what it means to insist on an unorthodox voice while operating within an art world which advances its own agenda. Hamada has been outspoken about his critical view of neoliberalism and its demonization of the Global South, and his work intervenes by allowing a type of communication which refuses to reinforce this system.
Manuel López Ramírez: Your oeuvre can generally be understood to evade symbolic references, instead opting for abstractions which nonetheless seem recognizable in their seemingly organic nature. What is it that the abstract offers within increasingly tightening, oppressive social frameworks?
Hiroyuki Hamada: This was intentional from the beginning. I was drawn to something unidentifiable in art works. It was not particular stories, ideologies, or opinions which I found moving. This appreciation was reinforced by the fact that I encountered visual art shortly after I moved to the United States. I was a student at a community college taking some art classes as a requirement. The art teacher blew my mind by speaking to me directly with visual elements, completely transcending our cultural differences. Art spoke to me better than English, which I was learning at the time. Art, when it’s successful, has a power to move us regardless of the cages around us imposed by authoritarian structures.
MLR: Your work has been exhibited in a wide variety of settings, such as Guild Hall of East Hampton, Southampton Arts Center, Roger Williams University, The List Gallery, Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art, Bookstein Projects, and O.K. Harris Works of Art. You have also been the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant, two New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships, as well as a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2018. You have found success within hegemonic institutions but have also been a consistent voice resisting censorship in our new contemporary political climate. How do you balance functioning in the establishment art world with personal resistance towards rising repression?
HH: Well, I don’t think it’s an easy task. I do believe that I have sacrificed exhibition opportunities along with social positions due to my open critiques of capitalist hegemony and its crimes. Art as a social institution has been heavily domesticated by the capitalist structure. I don’t think I have been the most successful artist at balancing the potential of what I do in my studio. This is bound to happen since all prominent social institutions are susceptible to the domestication by the ruling class interests. The political agendas of all corporate political parties capture arts organizations in framing what is acceptable as good art, conditioning artists and art workers with financial incentives. However, art making involves going beyond trending frameworks and revealing a wider truth that resonates among the general public.
#82, 78 x 61 x 26 inches, pigmented resin, 2017-18 from artist’s studio, 2018
B14-07, 44 x 36 inches, piezography on cotton rag, 2018 (L) and #82, 78 x 61 x 26 inches, pigmented resin, 2017-18 from Hiroyuki Hamada: Sculptures and Prints at Guild Hall, East Hampton, NY, 2018
HH: My studio practice involves careful observations of elements, connecting dots, and letting phenomena emerge naturally regardless of my preconceived ideas. When I look at things outside of the studio, I see lots of contradictions due to distortions enforced by the authoritarian social formation in order to perpetuate social hierarchy. In fact, anyone who wishes to truly excel in any field would face the wall presented by the capitalist imperatives. This, I believe, has been contributing to the decline of Western culture in general. We’ve been domesticated to be manageable within the capitalist cage. So voicing my concerns in societal terms can’t really be separated from the concerns in my studio. And this has negatively affected my ability to reach my full potential audience. That’s why we need an organization like Collecteurs.
MLR: Your Instagram account and blog present your followers with profound reflections on your practice, as well as your own thoughts on contemporary happenings. They might even serve, to anyone who reads them, as entry points for interpretation of your own work. What might writing, in this sense, offer to the artist in terms of their practice?
HH: I think art making is inherently a social activity in which we share our perceptions and ways of seeing with others. My personal findings in the studio don’t emerge out of a vacuum, they are relevant to the contexts we share in one way or another with the viewers. Supplying my thoughts during the process might be my way of greeting the viewers, welcoming them, since the form, elements, materials, and the work itself can’t speak our language.
#74, 24 1/2″ x 24 1/2″ x 57″, painted resin, 2011-13 from Off the Block at Southampton Arts Center, Southampton, NY, 2014
#53, 38 diameter x 14 1/2 inches, enamel, oil, plaster, tar and wax, 2005-08 (L) and #63, 45 x 40 x 24 inches, burlap, enamel, oil, resin, tar, wax and wood, 2006-10 (R) from Hiroyuki Hamada at Art Sites at Art Sites, Riverhead, NY, 2010
#63, 45 x 40 x 24 inches, burlap, enamel, oil, resin, tar, wax and wood, 2006-10 from artist’s studio
#99, 41 x 75 x 41 inches, painted resin, 2023 (L) and #87, 54” x 40” x 11 3/4”, pigmented resin, 2019 (R) from Matter on Ground, Parish Art Museum, Offsite Exhibition, South Fork Natural History Museum and Nature Center, Bridgehampton, NY 2023
#99, 41 x 75 x 41 inches, painted resin, 2023 from Matter on Ground, Parish Art Museum, Offsite Exhibition, South Fork Natural History Museum and Nature Center, Bridgehampton, NY 2023
#89, 48 x 20.5 x 27 inches, painted and pigmented resin and wood, 2020 from Hiroyuki Hamada Recent Works at T’ Space Rhinebeck, NY, 2020
MLR: Considering your mentioning of the natural world as a source of inspiration or observation, what is your relationship to nature as an artist working in the context of a climate emergency?
HH: I believe that the notion of “climate emergency” has been very problematic when we consider the state of environmentalism. Carbon-centric measures have created green industries that pursue profits, and newly created markets exacerbate environmental degradations while totally eliminating real grassroots environmentalism. This trajectory has been pushed by the same corporate entities profiting from colonial policies with utter disregard for the environment. Quite a few hardened environmentalists and researchers have been noting the real impacts of the green industries, along with extensive digitization that requires enormous energy, on the environment to be devastating in terms of resource extraction related issues as well as increased use of fossil fuels.
HH: Ever since I moved to the semi-country side, I'm grateful that I can feel the change in seasons more. The rhythm of nature affects my life as it should. I like to plant fruit trees and other edible plants around the studio, learning how to grow them. It makes me aware of the other creatures living around and how life persists. It’s miraculous to see the yard turning green in spring after the cold winter. It reminds me that I’m connected to the cycle of life on this planet. I think agriculture should be rooted to the communities in line with what nature intends. This could ensure environmental integrity for community members while providing people with healthy alternatives to mass produced food items with questionable nutritional values and chemical additives.
MLR: You have previously described your process as slow and intuitive; a diving into mystery, and a consideration of accidents and possibilities that might arise in the creative procedure. How does such a way of making relate to your own views on our profits-obsessed, hierarchical culture?
HH: In order for ideas, materials, and visual elements to merge in cohesive and resonating ways, the dynamics among them must interact cogently for what they are. Accepting the unknown, mistakes and so on, reflects consideration for a wider reality that resides in the universe as well as within our unconscious minds. A forceful external intention skews the relationships among the elements, depriving them of the maximum potential for particular dynamics. This skewed force sacrifices the existence of some elements while disregarding the material reality permeating among us, making the results shallow and inauthentic.
Needless to say, the same mechanism is at work at the societal level for the pursuit of profits and perpetuation of economic hierarchy. For instance, our social relations are conditioned by the profit incentives of corporate entities far from our communities. They decide what is acceptable to our environment, to our health, and to our well being regardless of the actual consequences of the products. They don’t live in our communities, being subjected to the same environment they create. They create the whole environment to maximize efficiency and productivity for themselves—they domesticate people to harvest profits.
#90, 42 x 50 x 9.5 inches, painted and pigmented resin, 2020 from Hiroyuki Hamada at Gana Art Bogwang, Seoul, Korea, 2022
#76, 46″ x 37″ x 31″, Painted resin, 2011-13 (L) and #81, 24″ x 54″ x 25″, oil, resin, and wax, 2011-13 (R) from Off the Block at Southampton Arts Center, Southampton, NY, 2014
#76, 46″ x 37″ x 31″, Painted resin, 2011-13 from Off the Block at Southampton Arts Center, Southampton, NY, 2014
#55, 44 x 24 x 12 1/2 inches, enamel, oil, plaster, tar and wax, 2005-08 (L) and #54, 37 diameter x 26 1/2 inches, enamel, oil, plaster, tar and wax, 2003-08 (R) from The List Gallery, Swarthmore, PA, 2008
Hiroyuki Hamada #87, 2019 (painted resin)
Hiroyuki Hamada #87, 2019 (painted resin)
HH: When art is conditioned by the social framework to be useful one way or another, its life gets distorted or simply dies with the particular time or space. Artists might be able to see through the detrimental aspects of social formations since we are trained to connect dots in cogent ways, but for me art can’t be a mere tool to amend the problem. If it’s not true to its essence—which is also inherently revolutionary for not being bound by social imperatives—there is no point in making art for me. Art to me ultimately comes from a wider reality we can sense but not exactly comprehend. Art has the power to speak to people in different times and spaces. It resonates among us and gives us a sense of what it is to be humans. It empowers us to be a part of something larger and it also makes us humble for it. Art has saved my life when I felt that I totally lost touch with the manufactured reality permeating our world. Art making has opened my eyes to the true nature of our society. It’s not a coincidence that artists are often the ones who raise voices against destructive social structures.
End.