Hajime Sorayama Brings Chrome Futurism to Tokyo in His Biggest Retrospective Yet

The first thing visitors see is a body.

Three meters tall and polished to a mirror shine, the figure stands in a darkened hall at CREATIVE MUSEUM TOKYO in central Tokyo’s Kyobashi district. It is Major Motoko Kusanagi, the cyborg protagonist of Ghost in the Shell, reimagined as a towering “Sexy Robot” by illustrator and artist Hajime Sorayama. Light ricochets off chrome limbs and transparent panels, splintering across the floor and onto the faces of visitors lifting their phones to capture the scene.

The sculpture, “Sexy Robot_The Ghost in the Shell type 2,” is the centerpiece of “SORAYAMA: Light, Reflection, Transparency –TOKYO–,” a retrospective that organizers describe as the largest survey of Sorayama’s work to date. Running March 14 through May 31, 2026, the exhibition anchors Sony’s new pop‑culture museum and ties directly into a broader relaunch of the Ghost in the Shell franchise.

The show presents more than 50 years of Sorayama’s exploration of what machines — and bodies — might look like in the future, at a moment when artificial intelligence, consumer robots and surveillance technologies have moved from science fiction to daily life.

A new flagship show for a new museum

Organized by Sony Music Entertainment and curated by Tokyo gallery NANZUKA, the exhibition fills the sixth floor of the TODA Building, home to CREATIVE MUSEUM TOKYO. The museum opened in 2024 as part of the Kyobashi Saiku redevelopment, which aims to reposition the historic commercial district as a new hub for art and culture.

In English‑language materials, organizers call the show “a rare opportunity to experience, on an impressive scale, the very essence of Sorayama’s lifelong pursuit: the expression of light, reflection and transparency.” The retrospective follows an earlier “Light, Reflection, Transparency” exhibition at NANZUKA’s Shanghai space, expanded and reconfigured here under the “–TOKYO–” banner.

From advertising commission to global influence

Born in 1947 in Imabari, Ehime Prefecture, Sorayama began his career as a commercial illustrator in the early 1970s. In 1978, he created his first robot illustration for a whisky advertisement, a commission that became the seed of his now‑famous “Sexy Robot” series. The airbrushed, hyper‑real chrome female figures collected in his 1983 book Sexy Robot would go on to influence film, fashion and product design around the world.

The retrospective tracks that trajectory from the 1978 robot through recent works. One gallery presents large‑scale canvases of robotic dinosaurs and unicorns, rendered with Sorayama’s signature airbrush technique. Another, dubbed “Aquarium,” centers on a gleaming “Sexy Robot” shark, while an installation titled “TREX” builds an interactive environment around a chrome dinosaur. A “Mirror Maze” surrounds visitors with reflective surfaces and sculptural works, amplifying the show’s focus on optics and surface.

An archive room brings together materials from Sorayama’s many commercial collaborations. Among them are drawings and prototypes for Sony’s AIBO entertainment robot dog, whose first generation earned Japan’s Good Design Grand Prize and a place in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. There are also materials related to his cover art for Aerosmith’s 2001 album Just Push Play, along with documentation of later projects with luxury brands such as Dior and watchmaker Roger Dubuis.

In another space, a new video installation uses large‑scale projections to immerse visitors in Sorayama’s half‑century of robot imagery, with a particular emphasis on how metallic surfaces catch and distort light.

A coordinated “Ghost in the Shell” rollout

The Motoko Kusanagi sculpture debuts as part of a coordinated rollout with “Ghost in the Shell The Exhibition,” opening Jan. 30 at TOKYO NODE in Toranomon Hills. A companion piece, “Sexy Robot_The Ghost in the Shell type 1,” premieres there. Both statues stand about three meters high and are described by organizers as attempts to depict a “body of the future” in three dimensions.

In a statement released through the official Ghost in the Shell website, Sorayama said he approached the project with “respect and affection for Shirow Masamune,” the creator of the original manga.

“While staying close to the concept of ‘Ghost in the Shell,’ I also reflected my own aesthetics,” Sorayama said. Working with the character in three dimensions, he added, allowed him to express Motoko’s “presence and world with greater freedom.”

The collaboration coincides with the 30th anniversary of director Mamoru Oshii’s 1995 Ghost in the Shell animated film, widely regarded as a milestone in cyberpunk cinema. It also aligns with a new television series, The Ghost in the Shell, produced by studio Science SARU and scheduled to begin airing in July 2026. Sorayama designed the title logo for that series, further cementing his role in the franchise’s latest visual identity.

Sony’s bet on location-based pop culture

For Sony, the exhibition functions as both a major art event and a showcase for its broader cultural ambitions. CREATIVE MUSEUM TOKYO is operated with support from Sony Music Entertainment and Sony Creative Products, and the Sorayama show lists Sony Honda Mobility as a special sponsor.

Sony executives have described the museum as a platform for “location‑based entertainment,” a term the company uses for immersive, tech‑driven experiences anchored in its intellectual properties, from anime and manga to music and games. The venue is equipped with advanced audiovisual systems and sensors that can tailor sound and lighting to visitor movement, and it is expected to host around four large‑scale exhibitions per year.

The Kyobashi district, long known more for offices than for nightlife, is central to that strategy. The TODA Building and adjacent developments now house the Artizon Museum, the National Film Archive of Japan and multiple galleries. Local officials and corporate backers have said they hope the cluster will draw domestic and international visitors and reshape the neighborhood’s image.

The Sorayama retrospective is positioned to test that idea. International media and travel guides have already highlighted the show as a key draw for visitors to Japan in 2026, often noting the overlap with the Ghost in the Shell exhibition at TOKYO NODE. Together, the two venues offer fans a chance to see both new Motoko sculptures within a short subway ride.

When science fiction stops feeling speculative

The exhibition also arrives at a time when some of the ideas that animated Sorayama’s early work — about human‑machine hybrids, artificial bodies and the allure of technology — are no longer speculative. Consumer robots like AIBO, rapidly advancing AI systems and expanding surveillance networks have made questions about embodiment, autonomy and control newly tangible.

In that context, the reflections cast by Sorayama’s chrome surfaces carry more than aesthetic weight. Visitors move through rooms where their own images appear, fragment and reappear in polished metal and glass, often framed by humanoid or animal forms that are part machine, part fantasy.

By the time they step back out onto Kyobashi’s streets, the city outside — with its LED billboards, camera‑studded intersections and crowds lit by phone screens — can feel only a shade less futuristic than the worlds Sorayama has spent five decades imagining.