Naotaka Hiro

Naotaka Hiro (b. 1972, Osaka, Japan) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Pasadena, California, whose practice explores the "unknowability of the body" through drawing, painting, sculpture, and video. His work investigates the limitations of perceiving one’s own physicality without external aids like mirrors or cameras, often pushing his body to physical extremes to document and comprehend these unseen spaces. Hiro’s instinctive and performative approach blends the gestural experiments of Japan’s Gutai Group with the West Coast performance art he encountered after moving to California’s Bay Area in 1991.

Hiro received his BFA from the University of California, Los Angeles (1997) and his MFA from the California Institute of the Arts (2000). His work has been exhibited internationally at institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. Hiro’s art is included in prestigious collections, including MoMA, the Whitney, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. He has received grants from the Art Matters Foundation (2014) and the Asian and Pacific Islander Artist Presenting Initiative (2006). Hiro’s exhibitions, such as Green Door (Herald St, London, 2021) and Sand-man (Bortolami, New York, 2022), have been critically acclaimed for their exploration of the body’s material and psychological dimensions.