梅雨入り
ハーゲンダッツのソルベがおいしいです。
Sorbet of Haagen-Dazs is delicious.
"Ubena-Ubena" Review
Photography soothes the fevered brow
Cristoph Mark / Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer
I was in the foulest of moods when I arrived at the tiny Gallery Archipelago in Kayabacho, Tokyo, hardly ready to give a fair review to some young new artists.
But the photography and the photographers themselves--Nozomi Shimokawa, Naoko Funaki and Kaori Yasui--helped me relax and stopped my mind racing with the events of the day. Everything about the artists, their work, even the gallery itself, was feminine--not in a pink and frilly way, but in the most calming sense of the word.
Though the exhibition, titled ubena-ubena, was designed solely for the purpose of giving the three friends an excuse to show their pictures together, each of the 25-year-old artists shares a similar vision of a (mostly) uninhabited world of soft, yet stark, earth tones, buildings and nature.
Shimokawa and the others claim this was unintentional. "We don't think our artwork looks the same," she says with a laugh, "But everybody else tells us it does."
Each of the works by Shimokawa--the most outspoken of the group, which uses the gallery as a permanent place to showcase their work--was originally taken as a snapshot during her travels around the country. The seasons were her inspiration, and indeed, the subtle lighting does reveal the time of year, while still maintaining the toned-down appearance of all of the pieces on display.
Most of them were taken in winter, but one piece, which depicts a meeting room in the countryside, offers the most color of any of her pictures, with sunlight shining through tinted yellow and gold glass.
Much of the work by Yasui, meanwhile, focuses more on shapes and textures used in buildings. One picture presents the viewer with a shadow cast across a beveled metal door, creating a stylized letter "S." Her other photographs are often even more abstract as she zooms in close on the textured stucco of a wall, for example.
Yasui is also the artist behind what, for me, was the standout work of the exhibition--a photograph of her father sleeping on a hardwood floor. The work catches a moment in time that somehow feels as if it's continuing, that the man in the picture could shift in his sleep at any moment. The red and brown of the photo, meanwhile, complement perfectly the man's salt-and-pepper hair.
On the far wall sits the photography of Funaki. Her work is displayed in sets of three panels, with each set containing a portrait of a young woman, nature and human interaction with nature. The portraiture is what really sets her work apart from that of the others.
With each of the expressionless women she portrays--all of whom are facing the camera straight on and are shot from the waist up--Funaki relies on the similarity in style and appearance shared by many Japanese women, but also chooses her subjects because of the connection she feels with them and the parts of herself that she recognizes in them.
While I would never suggest gallery-hopping while angry, ubena-ubena may be just what's needed when it's one of those days.
Gallery Archipelago is a 10-minute walk from Kayabacho Station on the Tozai subway line. Until May 26, open 12 p.m.-7 p.m. (closed Mon. and Tues.) Admission free.
エメ・ジャケ Aim? Jacque／次期日本代表監督？
