FEBRUARY 13, 2024 KATE MOTHES
All images © Eriko Kobayashi
Eriko Kobayashi’s incredibly lifelike sculptures of fried eggs, bacon, and gummy bears are made from the last thing you’d want to take a bite out of. Formed entirely of glass, the Seattle-based artist’s hyperrealistic works explore our relationship with routine meal times, comfort foods, and the nostalgia of brands like Pop Tarts.
“I believe that we make decisions about our clothing, food, and everyday requirements based on a feeling of intimacy and sympathy with the products,” Kobayashi tells Colossal. Tapping into universally recognizable items, like the ubiquitous breakfast menu of eggs and bacon, the artist draws on her own nostalgia, portraying fare she often has close at hand. She views glass as a medium that can both encapsulate and accumulate experience.
Kobayashi uses a technique called hot casting, in which individual pieces are fused together at high temperatures in a handmade mold. “I always seek new invigoration and try to make pieces that deepen thought, give off a positive feeling, and arouse curiosity,” she says. “The discipline required to convincingly create an object in glass demands that I spend a long, concentrated period of time making that object.”[…]
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