Category: Photography

I thought to write my blog everyday from now as long as I can. So this is kind of self discipline test to attempt this public journal.

The condition in Europe is severe. Then this global emergency could be compared to that of a war.

Here in Japan however, the government is lax and merely suggested people of going out. In grocery shop cashier line, people queue just as before without a safe distance. People hang out just the same since restaurants are open, and people commute to office. Business as usual, despite the global pandemic.

I fear the consequences of these inadequate precautions.

Yesterday I took photo in a nearby park despite the corona virus. The model came all the way from Tokyo just for me.

It was such a beautiful day, and we had obento lunch box in the park and played Minecraft and took photos.

It has been a while since I have touched my camera. Many things have happened in my life and I just have not had the chance or mood for photo. I have not wanted to take photo actually. I felt like my pictures have turned their back on me.

But yesterday I felt the natural continuation of my journey as a photographer. Fundamentally for me to take a photo is natural action, regardless of others opinion.

I wish to continue this journey as stubbornly and innocently as I can.

What is the cost of the reckless race of economy for those vulnerable in the society?

Government in Japan hands out two masks per household and instructions how to wash them, while Adagio for Strings was played in the streets of Spain. They didn’t even get to keep funerals.

Japan should play Adagio for Strings too.

This is a sorrow country.

I have been busy living my life as a 3D designer in Tokyo company. I have had many difficulties in trying to adapt into the new lifestyle of working in a Japanese company. But I like meeting new people; humans fascinate me. I wish this lifestyle as a company designer would also invigorate me as a photographer.

I feel so many months have passed since I started commuting to Tokyo, and rainy season is here soon. I look forward see the hydrangea in full bloom.

Playing outside with my son and his friends has been a great joy for me. In my darkest hours of tears and self-doubt, my son was next to me. I am very grateful for him.

Photography is the way to watch the world. It reminds me not to waste a moment. As Susan Sontag said, photographs are a kind of melancholy objects. When moment is captured it is already gone and untouchable.

We humans are weak and sensitive to light and we perish too. So life itself has a sense of melancholy in it.

I wish to celebrate this melancholy with my photographs.

Someone said “When we meet a good person, we can get something invisible”.

It’s the kind of treasure I value.

This spring I will finally hold my exhibition ”金木犀”. Please wait for a moment for announcement of the schedule. The place will be the same; lovely Cafe Dou Dou next to Hakuraku station in Tokyu-line.

My black and white photo prints have been sleeping in the box too long now and it’s time for them to be released to the world.

Then, from next week I will start my work in Tokyo game company as 3D modeler. I look forward this opportunity and meeting new people. Tokyo has a kind of artistic power, something unique to the city.

I can already feel signs of early spring. There seems to be a promise of a change in season. I hope the change of environment will invigorate my art life as well.

Last year brought a lot of tears of losing a relative, and then a family member brushed shoulders with death. If I felt something, it was uncertainty. My house was wrapped in plastic wrap and scaffolding due to a renovation, there was almost no ray of sunlight entering. Then, this is pretty much how I felt most of the time.

I hope this year will be a brighter one. Let’s make choice of optimism.

When I think about my my past month, I think keyword for all this is “natural.” In Japanese the word is “shizen” 自然。It means not only natural expression but also nature. 自然な表現 “shizen na hyogen” would mean natural expression.

Even sweet water of a protected lake will flow eventually into open sea. Would you ask the water “why do you must go so far away, out of our reach”? No, we don’t ask the water. But we ask that from the wretched bodies of our loved ones when the hospital curtain is drawn. It has to be natural cycle, somehow.

Recently they paint my apartment exterior. My home is wrapped in gray cloud. I hear voices I don’t recognize during daytime, and dark shapes move outside my window. It was just like yesterday when everything was normal.

Message to the sun; sky is required.