Hiroyuki Doi

(born 1946) is a Japanese outsider artist and former chef.

Early life Hiroyuki Doi was born in Nagoya, Japan, in 1946.

Career Doi began his art career in 1980, after the death of his younger brother from a brain tumor, giving up his career as a chef and turning to art for solace. According to his friend Yoshiko Otsuka, a manager and art dealer, Doi originally had been making paintings of flowers and foods in oil or watercolor. Around 1985, he gradually switched to circle drawings, but Otsuka "did not see them until some time later". Initially, she thought the drawings were peculiar but then started experiencing their "energy, sensitivity and movement". Doi has been represented by Ricco/Maresca Gallery in New York. Doi's work was included in the "Out of Thin Air: Emerging Forms" exhibition, which occurred between September 2024 and January 2025 in the Menil Drawing Institute in Texas.

His workspace is decorated with plants and situated in the Asakusa district of northeastern Tokyo.

Style and reception The majority of Hiroyuki Doi's drawings are derived from circular agglomerations that expand into complex compositions, where each individual circle differs in size "from very small to nearly subatomic and masses by the thousands into forms whose outlines, topographies and sense of inner light vary tremendously". In 2017, he noted that his technique has changed; his tiny circles have become even smaller, and his imagery has obtained a more three-dimensional appearance. Doi cannot imagine using a computer to make art, saying that by drawing circles with his pen or pencil, he feels "truly alive and a part of the universe". "Untitled" (1990) — The Menil Collection, Houston. Gift of Stephanie and John Smither. "Untitled (HD 2210)" (2010) "Soul II (HDY 3014)" (2014) Doi's circle drawings are discussed in John Green's The Anthropocene Reviewed, which compares them to his endeavor of figuring out the "ideal form" for his signature, but he "can never quite achieve it".