To Catch a Moment

I have been thinking to start to use digital camera for my photography, after a long break.

Developing and especially scanning film is such a chore. I would take more photos if I have digital camera. Plus, now that I will be full time worker to a Japanese company, I doubt I will have enough time to develop film. Rather than sitting in front of computer scanning film, I’d rather go outside and shoot more.

One of the reasons why I dislike digital is that Flickr groups and descriptions of even really good photographers seem to always mention or focus to the camera, or lens or technique.

“It is important to catch good moments with a camera”, my friend said. Indeed.

Now that I look at the photos I have taken over the years, I really don’t care whether I’ve taken them with digital or film camera. Both are good, and both have their sides.

Enjoy your life and enjoy photographing your life.

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

It’s the kind of treasure I value.

Spring is coming

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.

Nature

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.

Uncertain

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.

Late October

One year ago I was hospitalized due to a broken vertebra. A friend visited me and presented me a disposable camera. I took pictures with it.

Prints

I have been going to dark room a lot lately to make prints for my exhibition. It is so hard work to make silver- gelatin prints in traditional way. But I am quite happy with the result I get with help of great masters in DR.

I like contrast and darkness in photo.

Then, I am also happy that these photos are basically never filtered through digital medium, these are completely just chemical reaction on paper.

Seeing these images in computer screen don’t quite do them justice. Please come and see them in person next month.

金木犀

I will hold a photo exhibition in a small cafe in Hakuraku, Yokohama in November. Please come and see my photos.