Artists
Katsuhiro Yamaguchi
Selected Works
About Katsuhiro Yamaguchi（1928–2018）
Born in Tokyo in 1928, Katsuhiro Yamaguchi was a pioneering figure in Japanese media art and Kankyō Geijutsu (environmental art) — a practice in which architectural space, elements of various media, and human beings are brought together as part of an urban environment.
In 1951, he began his career as a core member of Jikken Kōbō (Experimental Workshop), an avant-garde collective formed around the poet and critic Shūzō Takiguchi. During this period, Yamaguchi produced a series of innovative works, including his Vitrine series, which made use of the refraction of light. In the 1960s, he further developed the intermedia-based practice he had pursued through Experimental Workshop, expanding his work to incorporate light, moving images, and sound, while actively advancing the idea of “environmental art.”
At Expo ’70 in Osaka, Yamaguchi served as art director of the Mitsui Group Pavilion, where he developed pioneering environmental works combining moving images, light, and spatial elements. In 1972, he also participated in the founding of Video Hiroba (Video Plaza), one of Japan’s earliest collectives devoted to video, and was quick to explore the social and communicative possibilities of this newly emerging medium.
Yamaguchi later worked actively as a professor at the University of Tsukuba and as a theorist, mentoring numerous artists. Throughout his life, he explored the relationship between new technologies and art through both practice and theory.
Major exhibitions include “Katsuhiro Yamaguchi: Pioneer of Media Art—From Jikken Kōbō to Teatrine,” which surveyed sixty years of his activities through approximately two hundred works and archival materials (The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura, 2006; later travelling to the Museum of Modern Art, Ibaraki, and other venues); “Experimental Workshop: Pioneering Postwar Art” (Setagaya Art Museum, 2013–14); and “Katsuhiro Yamaguchi: From the ‘Diary’ (1945–1955)” (The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura Annex, 2022). Even after his death, his work continues to be re-examined, and his pioneering practice has received renewed attention for its importance to the histories of postwar Japanese art, media art, and intermedia.
In 1951, he began his career as a core member of Jikken Kōbō (Experimental Workshop), an avant-garde collective formed around the poet and critic Shūzō Takiguchi. During this period, Yamaguchi produced a series of innovative works, including his Vitrine series, which made use of the refraction of light. In the 1960s, he further developed the intermedia-based practice he had pursued through Experimental Workshop, expanding his work to incorporate light, moving images, and sound, while actively advancing the idea of “environmental art.”
At Expo ’70 in Osaka, Yamaguchi served as art director of the Mitsui Group Pavilion, where he developed pioneering environmental works combining moving images, light, and spatial elements. In 1972, he also participated in the founding of Video Hiroba (Video Plaza), one of Japan’s earliest collectives devoted to video, and was quick to explore the social and communicative possibilities of this newly emerging medium.
Yamaguchi later worked actively as a professor at the University of Tsukuba and as a theorist, mentoring numerous artists. Throughout his life, he explored the relationship between new technologies and art through both practice and theory.
Major exhibitions include “Katsuhiro Yamaguchi: Pioneer of Media Art—From Jikken Kōbō to Teatrine,” which surveyed sixty years of his activities through approximately two hundred works and archival materials (The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura, 2006; later travelling to the Museum of Modern Art, Ibaraki, and other venues); “Experimental Workshop: Pioneering Postwar Art” (Setagaya Art Museum, 2013–14); and “Katsuhiro Yamaguchi: From the ‘Diary’ (1945–1955)” (The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura Annex, 2022). Even after his death, his work continues to be re-examined, and his pioneering practice has received renewed attention for its importance to the histories of postwar Japanese art, media art, and intermedia.