Hiro Yamagata, Arnold Swartznegger and Frank Gehry at the opening of T R A N S I E N T at Gehry's Studio in Los Angeles, 2007

Quantum X3 installation at the Guggenheim in Bilbao, Spain, 2004 / 2005

"This series explores the transient world beneath the surface of consciousness. We experience life on many levels and our conscious mind is only the beginning. The human brain does not function like a computer, simply taking in information and processing data. While the conscious mind is engaged - in conversation, watching a film, listening to a piece of music, holding hands with a lover or soothing a crying child - the subconscious mind is simultaneously activated. Our experience in the moment stirs up thoughts, emotions and images, and these materialize, seemingly out of thin air. They rise up from within buried memories, forgotten dreams and fleeting ideas, and are coaxed to the surface by conscious experience. Physical touch or the inflection in a stranger's voice suddenly stir the imagination and bring forth long forgotten memories. The shadow images often flash across the mind too quickly for us to capture and we are left with a fleeting impression, a vibration of emotion that we cannot quite grasp. So each interaction is much more complex than it appears on the surface. There is the conscious, physical experience and the feelings and thoughts that are provoked by that experience. Even as we live in the moment, we simultaneously experience a second, third, fourth or fifth reality. This place, between our many levels of consciousness, this shadowy world in the human mind, is the subject of this series. T R A N S I E N T  attempts to unlock the mind's internal door and allow the viewer to walk through the shadows - to discover what lies beneath the surface of their own mind."  Hiro Yamagata - 2008