Drawing from the Reservoir of Images

Today, the most prolifically produced thing by humankind is said to be the image. It is estimated that over 3 billion visual images are generated daily. Social media platforms like Instagram—built upon visual imagery—make it clear: we are immersed in a torrent of images.

This torrent is made possible by smartphones connected to the internet, enabling visual images to gain abnormal productivity, explosive self-replicability through post-production, and unprecedented shareability. In an era where anyone can easily produce, edit, and share images, the reality constructed by these images sometimes feels more convincing than the physical reality our bodies perceive—even though images are layered with countless fictions. We internalize these images—draped in virtual veils over our embodied perception—as a form of communication or experience, and often accept them as more “real” than reality itself.

We live in a time where the boundary between the real and the virtual has blurred to an unprecedented degree. In this increasingly ambiguous world, we search for a fixed point—an absolute idea (Idea) to perch upon.

In this exhibition, Tateisi intricately portrays our current condition in relation to images, and poses profound questions: What does it mean to be human in the age of artificial intelligence? and What is the essence of creativity, often said to be uniquely human? He attempts to manifest the idea of our time—a concept that cannot be ignored in any discussion of creativity. While invoking Idea may seem simplistic, Tateisi is fully aware of the concept’s dual nature: its noble resonance and its grounded, practical implications.

The Latin word Idea originates from “that which is seen,” and structurally can be understood as “id = it” and “ea = those.” This linguistic breakdown suggests that every image we perceive (the “it”) is made meaningful only in relation to the collective (the “those”) that frames and surrounds it. In other words, both the raw image and the truth it leans on, the real and the fictional, the individual and the collective—these binary elements are organically entangled.

To approach this Idea as closely as possible, Tateisi employs Instagram’s hashtag function—a structure of language-image correlation—to collect vast numbers of images related to specific subjects. These images, sometimes numbering in the hundreds of thousands or even millions, are then reassembled through AI into assemblage-like visual works. The exhibition’s subtitle, “The Moon Seen by 336,666 People,” epitomizes this approach: over 330,000 images associated with hashtags related to “the moon” are aggregated in an attempt to extract the essence—the Idea—of the moon.

Under the moon that has gazed upon us since antiquity, works exploring the thresholds of human perception gather—artworks that examine the liminal spaces of time and space. The Comparative Study of Upload Time series focuses on the idea of time: universal yet ever-changing. The Halo series focuses on space: universal yet constantly in motion. These works reside in the reception area of HOSTEL NINIROOM.

A hostel serves as a kind of perch—a place where people from lands across time zones arrive, stay, and move on. It is within this perch that the exhibition begins.

Tateisi’s works function as meeting points of images collected through social media. Images are inherently translucent, and his works—composed of such layered images—invite viewers into a space where they can peer into a reservoir within the flow, and draw from it as if scooping water by hand. This meeting point of images overlaps with the hostel itself: a meeting point of human bodies, arriving, resting, and departing again.

This convergence—images as Idea / the body as Reality—and the oscillation at its boundaries form Tateisi’s unique sense of reality. The exhibition, composed of multiple layered realities and fictions, offers a space to confront creativity born at the edge of those boundaries: a trial in facing the Idea.

—Yuu Takagi