Erika Kobayashi
Novelist / Manga artist
Erika Kobayashi was born in 1978 in Tokyo. She currently lives and works in Tokyo.
Kobayashi creates works that are inspired from things that are invisible to the eye, time and history, family and memory, and the traces of place. She was awarded the 7th Tekken Heterotopia Literary Prize in 2020 for her novel, Trinity, Trinity, Trinity, published by Sueisha. In 2014 she was nominated for the 27th Mishima Yukio Award and the 151st Akutagawa Award for her novel, Madame Curie to choshoku wo (Breakfast with Madame Curie), published by Sueisha. In parallel, she has presented installation works both in Japan and overseas, which enable viewers to re-experience various scenes in which the elements of fiction and documentary from her writings drift back and forth between personal narrative and social reality.
Her other publications include the collection of short stories She Looks into the Mirror, the nonfictional work Shin'ai naru Kitty tachi e (Your Dear Kitty,), inspired by the diaries of Anne Frank and based on the diary of Kobayashi father, the graphic novel Hikari no kodomo 1.2.3 LUMINOUS (Children of Light: Luminous), which traces the history of the atom and radiation, and a book of her recent writings, drawings, and comics, Wasurerarenai Mono (I Can't Forget).
Kobayashi's recent solo exhibitions include His Last Bow, Yamamoto Keiko Rochaix, London (2019); 1F in the Forest of Wild Birds, Yutaka Kikutake Gallery, Tokyo (2019). Group exhibitions include Image Narratives: Literature in Japanese Contemporary Art, The National Art Center, Tokyo (2019); Roppongi Crossing 2016: My Body, Your Voice, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo (2016); and The Radiants, Bortolami Gallery, New York (2015).
READ ARTICLEWORKS
-
“Image Narratives: Literature in Japanese Contemporary Art”, She waited, U234 and U235 at Kiel,In My Hand— The Fire of Prometheus, 2019, The National Art Center, Tokyo, Installation View, Photo: Shu Nakagawa
-
My Torch, 2019, C-print 54.9×36.7cm (each, set of 47) Photo: Kasane Nogawa
-
“Image Narratives: Literature in Japanese Contemporary Art”, She waited, Ex Occidente Lux,Her, 2019, The National Art Center, Tokyo, Installation View, Photo: Shu Nakagawa
-
In My Hand— The Fire of Prometheus, 2019, C-print 43.2cmx35.6cm (each, set of 3) Photo: Kasane Nogawa
-
“Women Imagining Rooms: About the Diary of Lady Sarashina” Ichihara Lakeside Museum, Installation View
Your Dear Kitty,
2 Diaries (Anne Frank's Diary 1942-1944, My Father's Diary 1945-1946), 2019, Ichihara Lakeside Museum
Photo: Mariko Ohya -
I draw portrait of Anne Frank, 2009, 21.6x27.9cm cotton paper, pencil
-
Children of Light : Luminous, 2013, comic book, published by Little more
© Erika Kobayashi, Courtesy of Yutaka Kikutake Gallery
