Erie Iguchi
Contemporary Sculptor
Profile
Born in Aichi Prefecture in 1989. Completed graduate studies at Aichi Prefectural University of the Arts in 2015.
Creates sculptures that boldly transform familiar motifs, imbued with lustrous paint and humor. By incorporating contrasting motifs such as high heels, animals, pistols, and grenades, and subtly embedding conflicting elements like femininity, desire, and violence, the artist has established a unique style that simultaneously evokes a striking sense of unease and familiarity in the viewer.
Awards and Major Activities
- 2014 Tokyo Midnight Award: Excellence Award and Audience Award
- 2016 LUMINE Meets ART AWARD: Runner-up Grand Prix
- 2016 Solo Exhibition "Juu and High Heels" held
- 2020 15th TAGBOAT AWARD: Runner-up Grand Prix
About the Works
High Heel Series
Sculptures that merge a figure reminiscent of the Venus de Milo with the heel of a shoe, finished with lustrous paint. The form, where grace and strength, fragility and dignity coexist, quietly questions the symbolism surrounding the female body and aesthetic sense.
Juu Series (Pistols and Grenades)
The series of works based on pistols and grenades cannot be simply reduced to a "prayer for peace" or an anti-war message. Rather, by daringly rendering the vicious cycle of recurring war and violence itself in a lustrous, decorative, and at times kitschy manner, it ironically subverts the viewer's gaze. The fur covering the barrel of the gun, and the bijoux and rhinestones adorning the grenade, transform tools of violence into objects of affection, while simultaneously functioning as devices that expose the deception and peril inherent in that transformation itself.
Underlying this approach is an aesthetic that resonates with the photography of Man Ray and Helmut Newton—a worldview where elegance and violence, grace and desire, exist side by side. Images that conceal instinct and aggression beneath a sophisticated surface suggest that peace and war, beauty and destruction, are not opposing terms but always mirror images of each other.
Animal Series
In the sculptures featuring animals such as cats and dogs, the artist intentionally blurs the boundary between "animality" and "humanity" by combining vulnerable, relaxed postures with artificial objects like high heels and boots. The gleaming pair of shoes at the feet of a lazily sprawled cat is not merely a symbol of cuteness; it represents the very act of adorning the instinctive existence of creatures with human qualities such as sociality and desire.
This reflects Iguchi's consistent focus on the act of "dressing up." What appears innocent is often the most instinctive and most susceptible to the projection of human desire—Iguchi's animal sculptures quietly embed this paradox within humorous forms. This attitude of "questioning the flip side of cuteness" is the spirit that runs through her entire body of work, connecting everything from elegant high heels to dangerous "juu" (guns) and innocent animals under a consistent gaze.
Media Appearances
Appeared on an interview program on Fuji Television Network.