New Trends in Japanese Photography
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
New Trends in Japanese Photography New Trends in Japanese Photography edited by Filippo Maggia Cover First published in Italy in 2016 by Catalogue Acknowledgements Photograph by Skira editore S.p.A. Maiko Haruki Edited by Lieko Shiga Palazzo Casati Stampa Naoki Ishikawa Filippo Maggia via Torino 61 Tomoko Kikuchi Art Director 20123 Milano Texts by Toshiya Murakoshi Marcello Francone Italy Filippo Maggia Yurie Nagashima www.skira.net Michiko Kasahara Sohei Nishino Design Koji Onaka Luigi Fiore © 2016 the artists for their photographs Yuki Onodera © 2016 the authors for their texts Editorial Coordination Chino Otsuka © 2016 Skira editore, Milano Eva Vanzella Tomoko Sawada All rights reserved under international Lieko Shiga Copy Editor copyright conventions. Risaku Suzuki Valeria Perenze No part of this book may be reproduced Ryoko Suzuki Translations or utilized in any form or by any Chikako Yamashiro Susan Ann White and Barbara Venturi means, electronic or mechanical, and on behalf of Scriptum, Rome including photocopying, recording, or Yumiko Chiba, Yumiko Chiba Gavin Frew (text on p. 38) any information storage and retrieval Associates, Tokyo system, without permission in writing Katsuya Ishida, Mem Gallery, Tokyo from the publisher. Takahiro Ito, TOP Museum, Tokyo Printed and bound in Italy. First edition Aya Kato ISBN: 978-88-572-3279-9 Maho Kubota, Maho Kubota Gallery, (International trade) Tokyo ISBN: 978-88-572-3429-8 Aki Lumi (Italian trade) Takako Matsuda Miho Odaka Distributed in USA, Canada, Central Marie Okamura, Taka Ishi Gallery, Tokyo & South America by Rizzoli International Shino Ozawa, Taro Nasu Gallery, Tokyo Publications, Inc., 300 Park Avenue Takashi Suzuki, Yumiko Chiba South, New York, NY 10010, USA. Associates, Tokyo Distributed elsewhere in the world by Elisa Uematsu, Taka Ishi Gallery, Tokyo Thames and Hudson Ltd., 181A High Holborn, London WC1V 7QX, Special thanks go to United Kingdom. His Excellency Umemoto Kazuyoshi, Ambassador of Japan to Italy and to Michiko Kasahara, Chief Curator, Tokyo Photographic Art Museum for their invaluable collaboration Contents 10 Un certain regard Filippo Maggia 12 Contemporary Japanese Photography Michiko Kasahara 18 Maiko Haruki 28 Naoki Ishikawa 38 Tomoko Kikuchi 50 Toshiya Murakoshi 60 Yurie Nagashima 72 Sohei Nishino 80 Koji Onaka 88 Yuki Onodera 98 Chino Otsuka 110 Tomoko Sawada 120 Lieko Shiga 132 Risaku Suzuki 142 Ryoko Suzuki 152 Chikako Yamashiro 158 Biographies 2000–2016 169 Testi in italiano Contents 10 Un certain regard Filippo Maggia 12 Contemporary Japanese Photography Michiko Kasahara 18 Maiko Haruki 28 Naoki Ishikawa 38 Tomoko Kikuchi 50 Toshiya Murakoshi 60 Yurie Nagashima 72 Sohei Nishino 80 Koji Onaka 88 Yuki Onodera 98 Chino Otsuka 110 Tomoko Sawada 120 Lieko Shiga 132 Risaku Suzuki 142 Ryoko Suzuki 152 Chikako Yamashiro 158 Biographies 2000–2016 Filippo Maggia Un certain regard I went to Japan for the first time about Rising Sun, where they would “discover” twenty years ago, to prepare an exhibition on Ryuji Miyamoto, Naoya Hatakeyama, Toshio Japanese photography at the Galleria Civica in Shibata, Taiji Matsue and many others. Modena,1 and I was amazed to find that there As the curator Michiko Kasahara writes were many excellent photographers who were in her essay, this dearth of information either unknown or little known in Italy and derives mainly from the fact that at the time the rest of Europe. At the end of the 1980s, photography in Japan did not yet enjoy Daido Moriyama’s photographs had appeared the public or private support necessary for its in Europe about a decade previously. They promotion abroad. In the following decades would be followed by Nobuyoshi Araki’s we were able to become more familiar “scandalous” images in the early 1990s, with the images of Japanese photographers, thanks to the invaluable scouting carried out thanks to the work done by international by the magazine Camera Austria,2 which curators (I would mention, in this regard, always had its finger on the pulse, and its the retrospective organized by the San editor and photographer Seiichi Furuya, Francisco Museum of Modern Art in 2006, who followed Japanese photography. which revealed Shomei Tomatsu’s artistic At this time, Hiroshi Sugimoto had already prowess to the world),3 Japanese and foreign been living in New York for several years and critics, a new generation of gallerists and the was considered a fully fledged contemporary photographers themselves. And now we are artist; he was also well-established in the able to see how this important school has art system and represented by an important evolved and established itself as one of the international gallery like Sonnabend. most interesting on the contemporary scene. Yasumasa Morimura was also making This volume does not claim to be exhaustive, a name for himself abroad, before making but rather aims to provide a complete it in Japan. Eikoh Hosoe, Ken Domon and picture of the Japanese photographic milieu Kenro Izu completed the handful of Japanese during a major point of transition between photographers with whose work we were the generation of masters—the pioneer familiar. Except for those in Paris, to which Miyako Ishiuchi’s 4 name should be added various Japanese artists, such as Keiichi Tahara to the photographers mentioned above— and Jun Shiraoka, had already gravitated, and the current one. Fundamental to the and New York, where Kunié Sugiura resided, selection process through which the featured along with Izu and Sugimoto, people who authors were chosen was the collaboration wished to explore Japanese photography offered by those in Japan who work in the had no choice but to go to the Land of the photographic field, thanks to whom we have 10 been able to get in touch with artists who rather the need to take on a scene that is 1 Uno Sguardo sul Giappone, Modena per la Fotografia would have been very difficult to contact more complex than their own world—unlike 1999, Galleria Civica di Modena, curated by Filippo Maggia otherwise, especially due to the language Araki, or Morimura, who have both set their with the collaboration of Walter Guadagnini. 2 Daido Moriyama’s photographs appeared in the second problem. As a privileged observatory, the work against the backdrop of Japanese issue of Camera Austria, 1980. The volume Nobuyoshi Tokyo Photographic Art Museum was an “theatre”, understood as the refined blend Araki, Akt Tokyo was published by Camera Austria in 1992. indispensable point of reference, due mainly of tradition, life style and modernity typical 3 The Shomei Tomatsu retrospective, Skin of a Nation, to the democratic and open-minded attitude of Japan. However, this need is experienced promoted by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, it has always adopted towards Japanese profoundly by each of these artists, and was curated by Leo Rubinfien, Sandra S. Phillips and John photography,5 embracing everything from regularly manifests in their work, in both W. Dower, and travelled between 2004 and 2006. 4 traditional reportage to cutting-edge the planning and the formal rigour that Miyako Ishiuki, Mother’s 2000-2005 – Traces of Future, curated by Michiko Kasahara, 51st Venice Biennale, 2005, multimedia trends. distinguishes their images. Japanese Pavilion. Within the broad spectrum of approaches Seen from the outside, the contemporary 5 Since the early 2000s, the Tokyo Photographic Art and modus operandi, we sought to identify Japanese scene is remarkably complex, Museum has regularly organized thematic group exhibitions those artists whose works represent the extremely varied, and even enticing. The fact featuring four or five photographers, under vitality and fluidity of current research, that it is impossible to define one or more the title Contemporary Japanese Photography. while at the same time including various trends is extremely positive: there are so many 6 The ages of the artists featured in this volume range authors who, while adopting quite different different fields of research, all explored with from 36, namely Toshiya Murakoshi and Lieko Shiga, to 55, Koji Onaka. methodologies, attest to the generational equal intensity and with an originality that handover. Western photography so often lacks. And this One characteristic that significantly is another characteristic that makes Japanese distinguishes today’s Japanese photographers images unique. The photographers are able to between 35 and 556 from their European distance themselves from the weighty legacy and American counterparts is the need of the masters and take up issues related to to leave their homeland, which is more the changes underway in contemporary society, than evident. It is partly due to a still weak addressing them in limpid works that can be domestic market system (the galleries formally classic yet incisive, raw and essential. themselves operate mainly in the Western This is a generation of artists who are rather than national market), but is mainly proceeding in open order and still lack the seen as a means of gaining firsthand appropriate support, but are aware of their experience, which is indispensable, individual skills. They are also able to appeal to people’s and, in a certain sense, self-sufficient, sensitivity across the board, especially that that is without claiming to be universal. of the critics and Western public, who In other words, their choice is not informed seem to have been dulled by redundant by a desire to succeed or to emerge but aestheticism for years. 11 Michiko Kasahara Contemporary Japanese Photography Chief curator of the Tokyo This book contains a series of works selected work goes up, and it is purchased by public Photographic Art Museum by Filippo Maggia and myself. While there collections. After ten or twenty years they are can be no doubt that the selected artists are finally given a solo exhibition. In the majority representative of the Japanese panorama, of cases, this is the path taken by many artists.