Hiroshi Sugimoto: Reflections On Love Dolls

Reality and Illusion – these two grand themes have been central to human consciousness since its inception.
You could also call them “truth and lies,” but even lies have never been purely false in the Japanese worldview. Since ancient times, we have believed that a lie holds a fragment of truth, and conversely, that what we call truth is never absolute. In fact, a perfectly constructed truth is often considered a kind of falsehood. In that sense, the space between truth and lies is what we call the real world – this very world we live in.
The human heart always reflects the world through its own inner lens. People tend to see the world not as it is, but as they wish to see it.
As the saying goes, “a hundred people, a hundred ways of seeing.” Each heart holds its own perspective, and each questions the reality seen by the other ninety-nine hearts, suspecting them to be lies.
There is no inherent “truth” in the heart. However, ever since the dawn of civilization, humanity has deemed truth to be good, and lies to be evil. This became our moral framework.
Even mice squeak “chuu,” and crows caw “kaa” – if even animals cry out with such loyalty and filial piety, how much more must humans do so?
Such was the ethical view in the Edo period, but even these foundations—our views on truth and lies – must be questioned by modern minds like ours.
In more recent times, in the so-called modern era, the great European philosopher Nietzsche published Beyond Good and Evil. Since then, the boundary between truth and falsehood has grown increasingly blurred.
Especially nowadays, with the emergence of the term “virtual reality,” we find ourselves living in a world where illusion is reality, and reality is illusion.
Humanity, which has pursued technology with such dexterity and cunning, has now entered an era where we can create illusions that surpass reality itself.
As a symbolic manifestation of this phenomenon, I nominate Orient Industry’s love dolls as unprecedented masterpieces – revolutionary not only in the history of industrial products but also in the course of human civilization itself. I propose they be designated as a (rare) World Cultural Heritage.
Since the start of this century, the human psyche has undergone relentless transformation.
In particular, the rise of women in society has been remarkable. The near future may well bring a matriarchal society or an era where women dominate men.
In the face of female empowerment, young men find themselves at a loss. Their minds and bodies are wilting under the pressure – what I call “female phobia syndrome.”
In these dark and uncertain times, a single ray of hope has appeared – a comet of salvation: the love dolls.
Each one is a stunning beauty – or rather, not “beautiful” in the traditional, power-seeking sense, but more of the “cute” type that stirs the so-called baser desires. But then again, is there really superiority or inferiority in emotions? This, too, is a philosophical dilemma.
If base desires were ever to vanish from the human world, that would signal the end of humanity.
Indeed, base desire itself should be registered as a Memory of the World heritage.
But I digress. The skin of the love doll surpasses even human skin in its delicacy.
Those red lips, with the fullness of an eternal virgin.
In these dolls, the ideal image of womanhood once held by young men in the Showa era is perfectly embodied.
The reality that was once lost is now being resurrected – here, through the work of Orient Industry.
Of course, there are still challenges ahead:
A body-temperature maintenance system that simulates human warmth;
A speech module that allows dolls to respond when spoken to, including moaning and breathing sounds;
An automatic gaze-tracking eye mechanism;
A pelvic movement and tightening system enhanced with massage-chair technology.
When such technologies are perfected, I dare to dream that love dolls may finally attain “a heart” of their own.
Just as humans gained hearts when we evolved from animals, perhaps this too will be born from the discovery of new tools.
After all, it was the invention of tools that first awakened the human spirit.