Eriko Kobayashi | Artist Biography

“The joy of communicating with people beyond the barrier of words, and the reward of knowing that I might have created a memorable experience, even if just for a second, in someone’s life, is the most precious.” - Eriko Kobayashi

Eriko Kobayashi is a Tokyo-born creator known for her hyper realistic renditions of everyday objects in glass. Using the hot casting technique, she is able to reimagine the mundane items that we encounter in our daily lives and transcend cultural boundaries through the universal language of food (and art!). Eriko seeks to provoke joy and nostalgia in her audience through her playful but technically demanding artwork that often features highly recognizable eats like pizza and Poptarts.

From a young age, Eriko was always drawn to art. Growing up in Tokyo encouraged her to consider the ever-growing relationships we have with the ordinary items around us which would later shape her artistic endeavors. While she was at Jissen Women's University in Hino, Japan pursuing a Bachelor of Human Life Sciences, she had the opportunity to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This trip to the Met reinvigorated her passion for art and sparked a fascination with glass. Soon after, she enrolled and completed the Glass Certification Program at Toyama Institute of Glass Art. Because there were very few institutions in Japan that focused solely on glass, she relocated to the United States. In 2002, she received her MFA in Glass from Southern Illinois University In Carbondale, Illinois. After finishing her degree, she moved to Seattle to further focus on her artistic creation. Once in Seattle, she joined Pratt Fine Arts Centre in Seattle as an Instructor for the Teen Fused Glass Class and later an artist residency.

In less than a decade, Eriko Kobayashi has exploded into the glass art scene. In the past two years, Eriko has had numerous Artist-in-residences - most notably, Pratt Fine Arts Center in Seattle, WA and Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, NY. From 2015 to the present, she won top place awards in multiple exhibitions such as from first place in the Glass Art Society Student Exhibition at Tacoma Art Museum and first place in the Windgate Charitable Foundation Graduate Research Grant at Southern Illinois University. Eriko has also received scholarships to Pilchuck Glass School; Corning Museum of Glass; Pittsburgh Glass Center, Toledo Museum of Art, Penland School of Craft. She now lives and works in Seattle where she continues to create artwork that fills her audience with feelings of positivity and happiness. She loves that each person who views her work can have a different connection to the objects and find their own personal stories within her pieces. In the future, Eriko hopes to create an even more immersive experience through her work that is both intimate and universal.