Group Exhibition
“Decades 2000_2020”
■Venue
■Period
■Hours
■Artists
KANA KAWANISHI PHOTOGRAPHY
2-7-5-5F, Nishiazabu, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106-0031
Saturday, February 20th, 2021 - Saturday, March 27th, 2021 *Period extended. Please refer below for details
Wednesdays through Fridays, 13:00-20:00 | Saturdays, 12:00-19:00
(closed on Sundays, Mondays, Tuesdays, and National Holidays)
*temporarily closed during March 17 (Wed) - 20 (Sat)
Ishiuchi Miyako (Japan), Antoine d'Agata (France), Luo Dan (China)
ERIC (Hong Kong/Japan), Jinhee Kim (South Korea), Ai Iwane (Japan), Shen Chao-Liang (Taiwan)
Ryuichi Ishikawa (Japan), Seung Woo Back (South Korea), Mandela Hudson (USA)
□Cooperation
Announcement of Extended Exhibition Period
Part of the exhibition will be remain on view until Saturday, April 17th, 2021.
*Ishiuchi Miyako’s work is on view until March 27 (original closing date).
▼Instagram Live
with Mandela Hudson and Ai Iwane
Date & Time:
Venue:
Speakers:
8:00-8:40 PM on April 15 (Thursday), 2021 *JST
Instagram Live
Mandela Hudson × Ai Iwane × Kana Kawanishi
KANA KAWANISHI PHOTOGRAPHY is pleased to announce the opening of the group exhibition, Decades 2000_2020, commemorating the launch of the new photography magazine Decades (No.1 2000_20 Issue) by AKAAKA Art Publishing, from Saturday, February 20th. The magazine was launched by the Japanese photographer, Ai Iwane, and the exhibition will showcase the works of the ten photographers who participated in the first issue of the magazine.
Japan, France, China, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan, and the United States. While the coronavirus now divides the world, what are photographers living at the same time thinking and creating in each place? In order to find out, Ai Iwane approached photographers from seven different cultures and commissioned photographs and essays from the years 2000 and 2020, and bound them together in a magazine covering a 20-year time span.
This exhibition features the works of 10 photographers who participated in the magazine, including Ishiuchi Miyako, Antoine d'Agata, Luo Dan, ERIC, Jinhee Kim, Ai Iwane, Shen Chao-Liang, Ryuichi Ishikawa, Seung Woo Back, and Mandela Hudson. The works of 10 photographers (including related works) will be collected and brought together to form an exhibition. This exhibition is an attempt to bring the time axis of “20 years,” which was developed by turning over the pages of the magazine, into the exhibition space.
Ishiuchi Miyako
2000 | gelatin silver print | © Ishiuchi Miyako, courtesy The Third Gallery Aya
2000 | gelatin silver print | © Ishiuchi Miyako, courtesy The Third Gallery Aya
Mother's 25 Mar 1916 #13
2000 | gelatin silver print | © Ishiuchi Miyako, courtesy The Third Gallery Aya
In early March 2020, when the novel Coronavirus was yet to burst into a pandemic, I traveled to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum to take photographs of the recently donated relics. This was the place where objects that experienced August 6th, 1945 would eventually be put together, entwined with a time span of 75 years. I have repeatedly visited this place since 2007, which has approximately 20,000 donated items that are unable to become a past. Although the number of donations is decreasing year by year, another dress waited for me to be photographed this year. The folded dress, with no one to wear it, seemed lonely. I took it out into the light, smoothed out the wrinkles, straightened its chest part, and let air flow through the folds on the skirt. I released the shutter as calling the image of the woman who owned this dress.
(Extracted from the essay, “From Mother’s to ひろしま/hiroshima”)
Ishiuchi Miyako was born in 1947 in Kiryu, Gunma, and raised in Yokosuka, Kanagawa, Japan. She received the 4th Kimura Ihei Award for the series Apartment in 1979 and represented Japan at the 51st Venice Biennale in 2005 with the series Mother's. Her monograph ひろしま/hiroshima was published in 2008 and this series is still ongoing. She received the Medal with Purple Ribbon in 2013, and the Hasselblad Award in Photography in 2014. Her exhibitions have been presented at major art museums around the world, including Grain and Image (2017-2018, Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan), Postwar Shadows (2015, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles), and many others. Her solo exhibition Seen and Unseen - Tracing Photography is planned at Otani Memorial Art Museum, Nishinomiya City from April 3rd to July 25th, 2021.
Antoine d’Agata
2020 | © Antoine d’Agata / Magnum Photos. Courtesy MEM.
2020 | © Antoine d’Agata / Magnum Photos. Courtesy MEM.
from the series COVID-19, Paris, France, Lockdown, 2020
2020 | © Antoine d’Agata / Magnum Photos. Courtesy MEM.
BRUTAL REALITY IN THE SPACES OF NON-LIFE. IMMOBILIZED TIMES, PURE STATE OF PRESENCE IN THE WORLD, EXISTENCE REDUCED TO A FORM OF ABSORPTION. INCURABLE CYCLE OF SURVIVAL, COLLAPSE OF BEINGS INTO INSIGNIFICANCE, APOCALYPSE AS PERMANENT CONTEXT. / NAKED LIPS ON THE OPEN WOUND, WITH THE UNBEARABLE VIOLENCE OF RESENTMENT, THEY DESTROY THE SPIRIT OF A TIME WITHOUT PITY, PARALYZED BY THE FATALITY OF CYNICISM AND COMFORT. FICTION REFUSES TO ADAPT TO REALITY, CONDITION AND POSSIBILITY OF WHAT ONCE WAS AND OF WHAT IS. (Extracted from the essay, “INTOXICATION.”)
Antoine d’Agata was born in 1961 in Marseille, France. He is a photographer, filmmaker, and member of Magnum Photos agency. He studied at the ICP (NYC) and, among other prizes, was a winner of the Prix Niépce (2001) and the Rencontres d’Arles Author’s Book Award (2013). His photographs form part of a number of international collections and he exhibited in various museums throughout the world. His work can be read as the exploration of contemporary violence through two distinct perspectives: the violence of Day or economic and political violence (migration, refugees, poverty, and war) and the violence of Night or the survival of social groups marginalized by poverty who generate ways to survive through crime (drugs, theft or prostitution).
Luo Dan
2020 | archival pigment print | © Luo Dan
2020 | archival pigment print | © Luo Dan
from the series Nowhere to Run
2020 | archival pigment print | © Luo Dan
For the entire month of July, I drove around and wandered among those high plateaus alone. I could breathe easy, walk in leisure, and photograph to my heart’s content here—truly long-lost freedom. After nearly a half-year of isolation, repression, fear, and anxiety, my introverted-self contracted a case of social phobia, and rarely engaged with others. Within my lens, human figures diminished in size and became increasingly distant. I photographed many scenes devoid of people. These were not desolate remote places, but right next to major roadways. I also photographed traces left in nature by human beings. Whether roadside or traces, they were all declarations of human occupation. This world is a world of humans. Is that true? It is definitely also a world for viruses. (Extracted from the essay, “Nowhere to Run”)
Luo Dan was born in 1968 in Chongqing, China. He graduated from the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute in 1992. He is the recipient of several photography awards, including the prestigious Art Award China (AAC) for Photography Artist of the Year 2013, for his Simple Song series; the Gold Award for Outstanding Artist at the Lianzhou International Photography Festival (2008) for his North, South series. In addition, Luo Dan's works are collected by many art institutions and individuals, such as the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Peabody Essex Museum, and the Turney Photography Foundation. He currently lives and works in Chengdu, China.
ERIC
from the series WE LOVE HONG KONG
2020 | archival pigment print | © ERIC
Looking back through my finished monograph (“WE LOVE HONG KONG,” 2019), I noticed something new. They reminded me of a portrait series I debuted with 20 years ago. To me, they felt “the same.” The older series had a completely different motif and photographed children at the beach with the ocean as its background. It also included some unpublished works that featured adults. Since both series had a similar appearance as they were both taken in the daytime, I first wondered whether it was the visual aspect that made them feel similar, but it wasn’t only that. I noticed I was communicating the same feature of humans in both series through photography.
(Extracted from the essay, “The Indescribable”)
ERIC was born in 1976 in Hong Kong to parents from China. In 1997, he relocated to Japan upon the return of Hong Kong to China. He encountered photography at a photo store where he worked part-time. In 2005, he debuted with the monograph everywhere (Tokyo Visual Arts). He has mainly worked on street snapshots ever since and has lived in Okayama since relocating from Tokyo in 2016. His publications include GOOD LUCK CHINA (2008, AKAAKA), LOOK AT THIS PEOPLE (2011, AKAAKA), EYE OF THE VORTEX (2014, AKAAKA), Good Luck Hong Kong (2018, Zen Foto Gallery), and WE LOVE HONG KONG (2019, AKAAKA).
Jinhee Kim
2019 | archival pigment print | ©︎ Jinhee Kim, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
2019 | archival pigment print | ©︎ Jinhee Kim, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
Finger Play-059
2019 | archival pigment print | ©︎ Jinhee Kim, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
Looking through magazines of the year 2000 to use in Decades, I discovered a surprising fact: I couldn’t sense the time span of 20 years when comparing the photographs I found there to those of the magazines of 2020 that I’ve examined for my other project. Furthermore, the female hand gestures of the society back in 2000 revealed a shockingly transparent, progressive, and at times more unaffected expression. The reason why I started the series “Finger Play” was because of my antipathy towards female hands acting the beauty that had been standardized by recent media; however, what I felt from images from two decades ago were unpretentious innocence.
(Extracted from the essay, “2000”)
Jinhee Kim was born in 1985 in Busan, South Korea. She completed her B.A. at Chung-Ang University (Seoul), Department of Photography in 2008. In 2010, her first monograph Whisper(ing) (IANNBOOKS, South Korea) was published. This series of works reflected her sympathy to the delicate pain and anxieties women of her generation struggled with. Since her later work She (2014), Kim has consistently used the method of applying embroidery of words or abstract shapes to prints in order to further express the women’s deep unconscious. She was awarded the Excellence Prize at THE REFERENCE ASIA: PHOTO PRIZE 2019 for the series Finger Play (2019-).
Ai Iwane
from the series “A New River” | 2020 | archival pigment print | ©︎ Ai Iwane, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
from the series “A New River” | 2020 | archival pigment print | ©︎ Ai Iwane, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
Tenshochi, Kitakami, Iwate
from the series A New River | 2020 | archival pigment print
©︎ Ai Iwane, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
“An ‘Oni’ crawls on all fours, in a grove of cherry trees after everyone has gone.” / Every spring, I visited a grove of cherry trees where traditions said that “oni” live in, because I could not stop thinking about the words a taiko drummer from Futaba, Fukushima once mentioned to describe his hometown he had been unable to return to since the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident. / Although I had planned to be in Fukushima this spring again, Fukushima was no longer the only place where people had disappeared under the cherry blossoms in spring 2020. / From Fukushima, I coincidentally visited Tenshochi (Kitakami, Iwate) in April 2020, and walked down the two-kilometer-long row of cherry blossoms that usually attract over 300,000 people in spring. As I walked under the trees that were no longer illuminated, the boundary between humans and beasts became blurred, and beasts were roaring in celebration of the regained darkness. / Have we lost another cherry blossom grove and have handed it over to them? I traveled further north to find it out—from Fukushima to Ichinoseki, Kitakami, Tono, and Hachinohe.
*Oni is a demonic, ogre-like creature in Japanese folklore.
(Extracted from the essay, “A New River Flows”)
Ai Iwane was born in 1975 in Tokyo, Japan. In 1991, she went to the United States to study abroad at Petrolia High School. After returning to Japan, She began her career as a photographer in 1996. Since 2006, she has focused on the Japanese American culture in Hawaii, and continues to work on the theme of the relationship between Hawaii and Fukushima through immigration. In 2018, her first monograph KIPUKA (Seigensha Art Publishing) was published. She was awarded the 44th Kimura Ihei Award and the 44th Ina Nobuo Award. Her publications include Journey towards Kipuka (Ohta Publishing), Hawaii-shima no Bon Dance (Bon Dance on the Island of Hawaii) (Fukuinkan Shoten), and her latest book, A NEW RIVER (bookshop M).
Shen Chao-Liang
I began to contemplate future creative directions on a foundation of continued writing of Taiwan’s internal state. Among these were, to directly or indirectly invoke events or spiritually symbolic metaphors relevant to cultural or geographical vistas in the trajectory of historical development. And then, on the one hand, I devote myself to present through a stylistic integration and visual editorialization, the various visages of national destiny as reflected in the implications of the land and history, while depicting the complex emotions of various ethnic groups in their response to the times; and on the other hand, I attempt to take further strides to connect Taiwan’s crucial geographical existence as the First Island Chain to the potential relevance and influence on similar issues in the global context. Revisit the past, survey the present, and interpret the future. Based on this concept, I collected a sampling of realistic and narrative images from all across Taiwan for the book “Floating” (2015-2020), which combs through potential issues of colonialism, national identity, ethnicity, cold war, human rights, aborigines, ecology, environment, and energy. From among my personal creative projects, this has been different from previous practices in terms of subject matter and geographic span.
(Extracted from the essay, “For the Past and the Future”)
Shen Chao-Liang was born in 1968 in Tainan, Taiwan. He obtained his master’s degree from the Graduate School of the Applied Media Arts, National Taiwan University of Arts. He has served as a deputy chief photographer for the Liberty Times, Taiwan, and has been an artist in residence at National Central University. Currently, he works on photographic creation, critique, and research, and holds workshops and plans exhibitions. At the same time, he is an adjunct associate professor at the National Taiwan University of Arts and an organizer of the Photo ONE, Taipei. Shen won the Golden Tripod Award for Best Photography (magazine category) of R.O.C. (Taiwan) in 2000, 2002, and 2012, the Asia Award in Sagamihara, Japan (2004), the Dong-gang Photography Award, Korea (2006), the Artists Wanted: Photography Category Award, NY, USA (2011), the IPA (International Photography Awards) 1st Place in Professional: Book of Documentary, LA, USA (2012), and the 2015 Wu San-Lien Award, Taiwan, among others.
Ryuichi Ishikawa
2020 | archival pigment print | © Ryuichi Ishikawa
—Twenty years later, most of my friends have returned back to Okinawa. Some of them introduce houses and lands to people, some install electricity and piping systems and design the interior of houses, some cook, some create music, and some designer clothes. We still carry the same kind of frustration we always had with us. We still think about it, and we are still fighting against it. When they came back to Okinawa, they left half of themselves in the cities. But the other half, which they still have with them, is probably what I had left behind me when I was young. They look so bright with that half, which makes me feel secure to be around them. Perhaps, I am the very half that they had left in the city. / This town and ourselves seem to be overlapping with each other; things seem to be changing little by little, or they might not be changing at all. (Extracted from the essay, “Offline”)
Ryuichi Ishikawa was born in 1984 in Okinawa, Japan. In 2010, he studied under photographer Tetsushi Yuzaki. In 2011, he participated in the Shomei Tomatsu Digital Photography Workshop. In 2015, he received the 40th Kimura Ihei Award and the Photographic Society of Japan Newcomer’s Award. Major solo exhibitions include Once thinking, nothing before eyes (2016, Yokohama Civic Art Gallery Azamino, Kanagawa). Major group exhibitions include Roppongi Crossing 2016: My Body, Your Voice (2016, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo) and BODY/PLAY/POLITICS (2016, Yokohama Museum of Art, Kanagawa). Photo books include okinawan portraits 2010-2012, A Grand Polyphony, adrenamix, okinawan portraits 2012-2016 (all published by AKAAKA), and CAMP (SLANT).
Seung Woo Back
2020 | © Seung Woo Back
2020 | © Seung Woo Back
from the series DAILY STAMP WORKS
2020 | © Seung Woo Back
This is an unreleased series that I have continued to work on since 2019. This project concerns the act of taking photographs every day, starting in 2019. Two works have been produced per day since the starting date—on January 1, 2019, two works, one for January 2, 2019, and the other for December 31, 2018, are produced; the following day, works for January 3, 2019, and December 30, 2018, are produced, and so forth. / The photographs that appear in this series are taken by me, are found photographs that I have selected from my archives, and at times taken from postcards that commemorate a certain place or location, also selected from my archives. / The date is inscribed over the prints with acrylic paint. The project concerns the creation of a fictional archive of selected images and stories that have interested me each moment of each day. Not necessarily headed toward a specific goal or purpose, the series is merely a part of my activity as an artist as well as research on the notion of photography I have been contemplating lately.
(Extracted from the essay, “DAILY STAMP WORKS”)
Seung Woo Back was born in 1973 in Daejon, South Korea. He completed a bachelor’s degree and dropped out master’s degree in photography at Chung-Ang University in Seoul, South Korea, and an M.A. in Fine Art and Theory at Middlesex University in London, U.K. He had a solo exhibition in Gana Insa Art Center with his series Real World (2007) and has lived and worked in Seoul since then. He has had more than 20 solo exhibitions in New York, Paris, Tokyo, and Seoul, and has participated in over 150 group exhibitions domestically and internationally. He was selected as a recipient of the Korea Artist Prize 2016 and was awarded the ILWOO Photography Prize in 2010. His works are collected in over 30 museums and art galleries, such as the J. Paul Getty Museum, the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, South Korea, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. He is a professor of Visual Communication Design at Hongik University, South Korea.
Mandela Hudson
2020 | archival pigment print | © Mandela Hudson
2020 | archival pigment print | © Mandela Hudson
Thief Theme, Beautiful Boogeyman
2020 | archival pigment print | © Mandela Hudson
My intentions were to use creative measures such as image-making and writing as a course of action to possibly shield myself and increase my vitality but when I compiled the photos I quickly noticed that they shed a light on a few crucial factors. First and foremost, without dedicated support and a fostering community, there is no way I could have made it to this stage of my life, and that the photographs also served as a pictorial representation of my loved ones’ attitudes, thoughts, and emotions. / For instance, the image titled “Thief Theme, Beautiful Boogeyman” is a made-up narrative used to challenge the thought process that wickedness comes directly from pure evil. It makes me think about how we sometimes see the outward appearance of a person but never question the inherited stereotypes or what is actually behind the mask. (Extracted from the essay, “More News from Babylon”)
Mandela Hudson was born in 1989 in Chicago, IL, USA. He is a multidisciplinary artist (with a concentration in photography) who lives and works in Chicago. His enthusiasm for multiple forms of visual communication assists in the overall practice of building skills and fabrication of projects in disciplines such as woodworking, digital inkjet printing, films, bookmaking, and design. His dedication and overall love for creating have been a major driving force in the work as he aims to build stronger networks with an array of artistic communities. In the fall of 2018, Mandela founded Projection Publishing. Projection works to promote and distribute artist books, memorabilia, and other periodicals that bring increased visibility and appreciation to various creative industries.
* * *
Iwane says that one of the motivations for creating the magazine “Decades” was the desire to communicate with photographers from around the world who are living in the same era in a way that cannot be experienced online.
What did each photographer think and see in the swirling vortex of the times? Derived from the dialogues between the photographers in “Decades,” this exhibition will present the years “2020” and “2000” on each floor and sterically exhibit how photographers from around the world have captured these times.
▼Publication Information
Decades (No.1 2000_20 Issue)
■Photography/Essays:
Ishiuchi Miyako, Antoine d'Agata, Luo Dan, ERIC, Jinhee Kim, Ai Iwane,
Shen Chao-Liang, Ryuichi Ishikawa, Seung Woo Back, Mandela Hudson
■Edit: Ai Iwane, Kimi Himeno, Kana Kawanishi
■Creative Direction: Kei Sato (Shateki, TURTLEHEADS)
■Art Direction/Design: Yuma Higuchi (YUMORE, MINAMI MUKI, TURTLEHEADS)
■Publishing House: AKAAKA Art Publishing, Inc.
Specifications: H280mm × W218mm, 200p, softcover
Language: Japanese, English
ISBN: 978-4-86541-130-0
Price: 2,000 JPY +tax
>> Details/Purchase（AKAAKA Art Publishing Website）
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