three: three is a magic number 19

INTRODUCTION

three is the artist unit with 3 members who came from Fukushima. They are known for their three-dimensional works and huge installation using numerous articles of taste like fish-shaped plastic soy sauce dispenser, character figures from cartoon, animation, and video game. They focus on "volume production/mass consumption" and "identity”, incorporating factors like “self”, “others”, “perception”, and “recognition” to emphasize the contrast between different phases such as physical/digital, two- /three-dimension.


Thousands of figures dissolved and melted by heat lose their original true nature like “personality” and “attribution”. Instead, they are reduced to sheer materiality of “color” and “weights” as if they represented the world of internet which brimmed with miscellaneous information, or the situation of contemporary society in which the course of identity is unclear. three's works visualize unsettling aspects of current society raising radical questions about "Who am I?” and “what is reality?”


In this exhibition, visitors will be able to see three's works spanning more than 10 years, from three-dimensional works in which a large number of figures are melted and reconstructed, two-dimensional works that imitate the screens of various devices of TVs, PCs, and tablets, to creations in which figures are contained in the devices themselves and inspired by manga and other media, as well as a new series that the artist has been working on recently.

three

17.7kg

Three-dimensional work

The 3D artwork "17.7kg" uses a large number of figures to create a new shape of a person. The surface of human-shaped sculpture is entirely covered with figures, and the cross section of the body, cut in half from the center, reveals a large number of figures melding together.


With the development of the Internet, various personalities can easily come together to form a massive "Something”.However, the power created by anonymous individuals is fragile and vulnerable. Once noise is generated, it has the potential to collapse into pieces. The idol, in which numerous personalities are condensed, offers a glimpse of the ambiguous and dangerous relationship between the "crowd" and the "individual”.

Two-dimensional work

Their signature two-dimensional work, "77V type 19.9kg," is made in the screen sizes of various devices such as actual TVs and game consoles.


Characters from anime and video games, which exist only in the two-dimensional world, can also exist in the three-dimensional world by being produced as figures. For these characters, who are fictitious personalities but can also exist in the real world, the screens of digital devices, where so much information comes and goes, are the boundary between the two-dimensional and the three-dimensional world.


The work visualizes the boundary between reality and virtual reality, and presents the danger of the real world in which the figures and we exist.

Bit Series

This is a series of individual pieces named after the smallest unit of information, "Bit". Each piece consists of one figure, forming a cube or rectangular shape. The  work simply expresses  the  fascination of turning a human or a two-dimensional character that everyone knows into a manipulable entity within the artist's control.


By preserving the basic form of the face that symbolizes the character, the attachment to the character immediately turns into a sense of discomfort. The pieces have a perfectly balanced nature in terms of their size and weight, yet the meaning they convey is profoundly transformed.

Display sereis

The series uses actual devices such as TV screens, game consoles, cell phones, and smartphones.


On the screens of these devices, it appears that a large number of animated characters are being projected, but in reality they are not images, but real figures are crammed into the screen.


The digital devices that have lost their original functions and the figures that are supposed to exist in the three-dimensional world are put back on the screen again, highlighting the ambiguity between the digital and analog worlds.

three: three is a magic number 19
2023.04.01 - 05.14

Karuizawa Gallery

1151-5 Karuizawa, Karuizawa-machi, Kitasaku-gun, Nagano, Japan
Tel: +81 (0)267 46 8691
Fax: +81 (0)267 46 8692
Opening Hours: 10:00 - 17:00
Closed: Monday
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