japan exposures » Gallery

Masahito Agake Gallery

Dirk — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 08:42:50 +0000

Even though there is nothing as mysterious as a fact clearly described, the world that we live in is hardly a factual affair. Emotions, perceptions and an infinite number of combinations between the two make our lives much more of a mystery than we would like to believe. Certain is nothing. What was a given yesterday is full of vague and potential eventualities today.

Photography in the streets and public is by now an established genre, yet the world we have created around us and enter with confidence on a daily basis remains a mystery beckoning visual exploration. A photographer’s mission is to peer into the cracks that give entry to another world, a universe that is not usually seen and often times we don’t care to see.

Masahito Agake is one more hunter and watcher who is ready to capture these seams in our reality when they become apparent. While some may dismiss his visions as “nothing new”, once you take your time with the material there is a detectable addition of his own views. Photos from Japan and Taiwan blend into each other, connecting dots of universality that are often glossed over. In his photography he uses digital techniques to add an intriguing textural glow and shimmer to the images, which in my view add an incentive for repeated viewing to the photographs. While this may not be to everyone’s taste, we encourage you to not look just once.

Masahito Agake was born in Tokyo in 1969, and works professionally as an architect. In the early 90s Agake began shooting casually while scuba diving, and after coming across the work of Aleksandr Rodchenko and W. Eugene Smith in 1996, he took up photography more seriously. He had his first exhibition at Tokyo’s Place M gallery in 2003, and since then has exhibited his work in different galleries in Tokyo. Most recently he has been exhibiting his work at Third District Gallery in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

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Aya Fujioka Gallery

Kurt — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 14:10:36 +0000

Profile by John Sypal for Japan Exposures.

Aya Fujioka’s photos are not those which espouse a refinement or a celebration of reality. The term “investigation” is inappropriate when attempting to relate them to any sort of exploration of the World. She is one of the few photographers whose pictures are perhaps best seen as evidence of intimate considerations from within the artist’s immediate physical and emotional presence.

Her first book, comment te dire adieu (for which she received the Visual Arts Photo Award grand prix in 2005) was born from a journey abroad but despite contextually understanding that she was a Japanese woman living and photographing in Europe this earlier body of work is anything but Travel Photography. Though this previous book referenced travel through nearly each and every picture I personally do not know if Fujioka travelled far from home when she created the content for her latest book I Don’t Sleep. It’s possible that many of the pictures were in fact taken directly within her family’s house. The majority seem to have been taken in Japan but yet again these images remain mute as objects expressing an evaluation of her native society.

Fujioka’s line of sight through a her camera often centers on a definite discernible object filling the frame. Her color palette is bolder than that of many of her female contemporaries in Japan. While it looks as though it might be easy to dismiss her pictures as “snapshots”, a second more thoughtful glance reveals an emotional pull which is less familiar than it ought to be.

Spending time with both of her books finds one her pictures truly building upon one another. Each turn of the page adds another reference point along a line which reveals through partialities the culmination of a personal emotional experience. It is about as close as one can get to being in another person’s head.

Rather than generalizations of any set and agreed upon feeling, Aya Fujioka’s photographs are distinctly mysterious, sensual, and unsettling in the way which few photographers are able to successfully create. Her ability to peer out and within each time she gazes through the viewfinder allows the realization of a body of work which is mesmerizing in it’s entirety.

Please also see the coversation between John Sypal and fellow Japan Exposures’ contributor Dan Abe about Fujioka’s I Don’t Sleep photobook.

I Don’t Sleep is available in the Japan Exposures Bookstore.

John Sypal, born and raised in Nebraska, USA, currently living in Matsudo city (Chiba Pref.). John has been exhibiting his photographs widely in the US and in Japan. His photographs are frequently featured in Japanese photo magazines. He is currently a member of Machikata Sampo Shashin Doumei (Walking Photographers Alliance). John also enjoys meeting people and photographs their cameras for tokyo camera style.

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Ken Kitano Gallery

Dirk — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 02:00:38 +0000

The medium of photography was invented out of our strong desire to create a likeness of our reality — and ourselves in it. We then learned that the camera would see what our eyes never could — time being brought to a standstill. However, in actuality during the early days of the medium the relationship of photography and time was quite the opposite; long exposures, often using all of the daylight of a full day, had to be used to record a visible image onto the light-(in)sensitive material. And large format photographers to this day know of the tragic mistake of accidentally inserting their film holders more than once and recording multiple exposures involuntarily, spoiling the image. Ken Kitano masterfully takes us back to these immutable properties of photography creating images that we may have had already relegated to history. Images with deep substance, but with no detectable moment.

The terms flow and fusion ring ever so true when looking at these images. The flow of time, an hour, a day or even more, fusing in an eternal cosmic moment. The flows and traces of different lives of distinct individuals, unified in what could be the very essence of a human being.

Japan Exposures is honored to have the opportunity to present an extended gallery of Ken Kitano’s work. Please also see our profile of Kitano.

Kitano’s book our face is available in the Japan Exposures bookstore. If you are interested in purchasing a copy of Kitano’s Flow and Fusion, please contact us.

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Nipporini Gallery

Kurt — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 02:00:19 +0000

Nipporini is the pseudonym of the well-known commercial photographer Takahiro Wada, and a mash-up of the photographer’s hometown of Nippori in Tokyo, and the famed film director Federico Fellini. Wada’s “Nippori Guidebook” project and “Nipporini” persona as it were are a homage to his hometown, even as it also seems to be a calling into question of the slick and smooth world of advertising photography. Says Nipporini:

The democracy of Japan had the defeat and arose. How my parents adopted themselves to the conversion of ideology? The technique of prints that I had learnt at the photography school easily became unnecessary because of the appearance of the digital camera. I think I tasted the same circumstances as my parents a little. The world was made by 0 and 1 when I slipped out of my air-raid shelter of darkroom. If I had Fellini’s eye of love and freedom, could I find pleasure in the society of the lie?

Please also see our current Cover Photo featuring Wada’s Nipporini.

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Shinji Abe Gallery

Dirk — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 00:33:29 +0000

Japan Exposures is pleased to present the work of Shinji Abe, who at 26 is one of the youngest — if not the youngest — photographers we’ve featured. It may come as something of a surprise to readers of this website, but Abe is one of a rather sizable group of young photographers who not only embrace film, the darkroom, and the vagaries of the street as their subject, but who also don’t have an online presence. In Abe’s case, he doesn’t even have a personal computer. Whether by design or happenstance, this makes Abe the ideal type of photographer we hope to feature even more on Japan Exposures as we begin 2010 — young, up and coming, and to borrow a phrase coined by noted street photographer Nick Turpin, “virtually invisible”.

When offline is becoming the new online, then the street is the new stage where the workings of at least some of Japan’s society are laid bare to be examined by a sharp and scrutinising eye such as Abe’s. Similar to photographers like Haruto Hoshi (featured previously on Japan Exposures), Abe bids a final farewell to the quaint snap of the old masters like Ihei Kimura and meets contemporary Tokyo in the streets of central Tokyo head on. These are not street photos showing amusing juxtapositions featuring people going about their daily lives. Abe’s photos have a delightful unnerving intensity and unrest, full of energy and vibrancy of life, yet despite their visual power they never appear confrontational or provocative for the sake of it. The images are a revelation of how much street photography in the civilised Japanese metropolis still has to offer. Radical, essential and absolutely inspirational.

Please also see our Cover Photo featuring Abe’s work.

UPDATE: a slide show with more photos from the exhibition is available on the Third District Gallery web site. [Click on the top postcard image; thanks to Aya Takada]

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Tomoyuki Sakaguchi Gallery

Kurt — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 15:08:24 +0000

Introduced by Silas Dominey for Japan Exposures.

I first saw Tomoyuki Sakaguchi’s images of suburban Tokyo when I was in my third year of a photography BA and something of a transparency film snob. Everything had to be film, and the only purpose of digital was quick and dirty snapshots. Sakaguchi’s work was the catalyst that suddenly pointed out that fine art photography is not strictly the reserve of film. The appeal of Sakaguchi’s series Home is, for me, how effectively it marries the ‘look’ of digital photography to the content of the series. The strange quality of light and the unnatural saturation and tonality of the greenery have a uniquely digital aesthetic.

This glossy plasticity is at odds with an American photographer whose work provides an interesting counterpoint. Todd Hido’s large format series Homes at Night embodies everything Sakaguchi’s work eschews. Where Homes at Night is dark, subdued and atmospheric, Home is vibrant and saturated. Hido’s images are stuck in the past, whereas Sakaguchi’s are unashamedly modern. We need only look at the cars in Sakaguchi’s images to confirm this. They are brightly coloured, compact, utilitarian. They are also, in a very real sense, the main characters in this odd little nocturnal drama. They occupy each image with surprising presence and vitality, providing a link to the sleeping residents of each home.

[In addition to Silas' selection of images from Sakaguchi's Home, we're also pleased to present a small gallery of work from Sakaguchi from his earliest series "Mado" (2002) and his most recent work, "Ita☆Sha" (2009). -- ed.]

Please also see our current Cover Photo by Sakaguchi.

Sakaguchi’s book Home is available in the Japan Exposures bookstore.

Silas Dominey recently graduated from Leeds College of Art’s BA Photography Programme and currently works as a freelance photo assistant. His work can be seen at www.silasdominey.com.

Tomoyuki Sakaguchi – From Home Tomoyuku Sakaguchi was born in Kagawa, Japan in 1969, and...
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Manabu Yamanaka Gallery

Kurt — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 02:36:45 +0000

Manabu Yamanaka’s Gyahtei, published earlier this Fall, brings together Yamanaka’s six major series focusing on societal outcasts, including street children, homeless, the physically deformed, and the elderly. Working in a similar vein for over 25 years, each series might take up to four to five years to complete. Yamanaka doesn’t just bring his subjects into a studio but chooses to immerse himself in the milieu of his subjects and their living conditions before ever setting up his camera.

Yamanaka’s working methods, as well as the consistency of purpose and style he approaches his subjects with, clearly show that he doesn’t take his project lightly, nor is he interested in a quick hit of shock. In a 2005 interview, Yamanaka talked about his working process:

First of all, I decide on a subject for a project and then study and research the subject. And the next step is planning out picture composition [while] at the same time scouting, casting, and thinking about the other details. Finally, I start the new project if I convince myself that all of the above is in place. Usually it is not so easy, so I’m constantly making changes. I always find the appropriate way of shooting after I start. I believe that there is always a way through a difficult project.

The title Gyahtei as well as other series’ titles all originate from Buddhism. Even though Yamanaka has said he is not a practicing Buddhist, he does “always hope that I gain more understanding of Buddhism every time I finish a project. In other words, I show my work as a consequence of my understanding on the theme of the project.”

Manabu Yamanaka’s photographs are often referred to as disturbing, or unnerving, but perhaps that faint praise says more about the viewer than it comments on the actual work, the subjects of the photos, or the photographer’s intentions. In the way that some people peek through their fingers at horror films, labeling Yamanaka’s work as disturbing seems a defense mechanism, a way of distancing oneself from the visceral realization that what separates the viewers’ reality from that of Yamanaka’s subjects is what the Japanese call 紙一重 (kami hitoe) — a fine line. That Yamanaka can bring us so uncomfortably close to confronting that which we take for granted, and our corporeality and mortality, in the reserved and respectful manner that he does, might be one reason why the photographer Kyoichi Tsuzuki called Yamanaka the most “hardcore” of all Japanese photographers working today.

Japan Exposures is honored to have the opportunity to present to our readers the following introduction to Manabu Yamanaka’s work. Please also see our current Cover Photo featuring Yamanaka.

More of Yamanaka’s work can be seen at his website, including some brief writings about each series. A report on him in Japanese can be found here.

Gyahtei is available from the Japan Exposures Bookstore.n’

Manabu Yamanaka — Gyahtei #01 Manabu Yamanaka was born in Hyogo Prefecture in 1959, and...
2005 interview with Manabu Yamanaka 2005 interview with Manabu Yamanaka, whose work has just been...
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Yasuhiro Ogawa Gallery

Dirk — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:32:08 +0000

Japan Exposures is pleased to present the work of Yasuhiro Ogawa, who this year received along with Shintaro Sato the prestigious Newcomer’s Award from the Photographic Society of Japan. Ogawa was born in Kanagawa in 1968 and, influenced by the work of Sebastiao Salgado, took up photography when he was 24. His book, Slowly Down the River, was published by Creo in 2008. [Please see our review]. The gallery below of black and white work was selected by Ogawa himself. Ogawa’s website features ample examples of his work from many different series and projects.

Please also see our Cover Photo featuring Ogawa’s work.

Yasuhiro Ogawa — from Slowly Down the River Yasuhiro Ogawa was born in Kanagawa, Japan in 1968, and...
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Haruto Hoshi Gallery

Dirk — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 06:23:43 +0000

Japan Exposures is pleased to present the work of Haruto Hoshi, born 1970 in Kanagawa and educated at Contemporary Photography Research Institute. Hoshi’s intense and at times uncomfortable images show life in the large Japanese cities in a captivating and arresting style. He represented by the Third District Gallery Tokyo.

We are also featuring Hoshi as one of our Cover Artists.

Haruto Hoshi Haruto Hoshi was born in 1970 in Kanagawa prefecture....
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Masahiro Kodaira Gallery Japan Exposures is pleased to present the work of Masahiro...

Masahiro Kodaira Gallery

Kurt — Wed, 06 May 2009 12:44:36 +0000

Japan Exposures is pleased to present the work of Masahiro Kodaira, born and raised in Tokyo and educated at Tokyo Zokei University. Kodaira was an informal student of famed avant-garde photographer Kiyoji Otsuji, and Otsuji’s influence is clear to see in the following images. Presented here are five images each from Kodaira’s two major projects to date, “Dr. Lorentz’s Butterfly” and “Onbashira”. Please see our interview with Kodaira where he discusses his motivations behind both series, his relationship with Otsuji, and more. We are also featuring Kodaira as one of our Cover Artists.

Masahiro Kodaira – from Dr. Lorentz’s Butterfly series Masahiro Kodaira was born in 1972, and graduated from...
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