The favored subjects of Sugimoto’s highly formal photos include bodies of water, empty theaters, and constructed dioramas and sculptures.Ģ. Hiroshi Sugimoto is a supreme master of the craft of photography, using an old-fashioned large-format camera to produce his tonally rich black-and-white images. Drawing profound influence from Andy Warhol, his cartoonish and colorful paintings blend dream figures and references to childhood experiences with pop culture iconography.ģ. Keiichi Tanaami is a central figure in Japanese Pop Art. He photographs the cultural change and chaotic urban experience particular to Japan, typically in grainy, black-and-white images that he prints himself.Ĥ. Daido Moriyama is another “Provoke” photographer and, by self-proclamation, addicted to cities. He draws on far-ranging influences, from Walt Disney to Giotto.ĥ. Yoshitomo Nara is one of Japan’s best known painters and draughtsmen, capturing in his compositions both the fierce independence and bored innocence of childhood. Through this process, “the existence of the object itself is replaced by ‘a husk of light’, and the new vision ‘the cell of an image’ is shown,” he describes.Ħ. Kohei Nawa uses glass beads and prisms to cover found objects-from taxidermied animals to plastic toys-such that their original contours become variously distorted and magnified. “For a photographer, it’s a necessity that you can shoot stuff magically,” she says.ħ. Rinko Kawauchi shoots primarily with a six-by-six format camera, capturing eerily poetic images of natural phenomena-from light hitting the ocean to fire tearing through a forest. Takuma Nakahira was one of the “Provoke” photographers who revolutionized postwar Japanese photography with their dark, expressionistic photographs that captured the uncertainty, exhilaration, and tumult of life in the decades following World War II.Ĩ. Tatsuo Miyajima operates within specific material parameters: his LED lights come in a limited range of color, and count between numbers 1 and 9 without ever reaching 0. For the artist, the ticking numbers reference Buddhism and themes of inevitability, universality, and mortality.ĩ. Included are several artists who have pioneered a Pop-inflected and quintessentially Japanese aesthetic, as well as black-and-white photographers who capture the grittier, far less polished side of their country.ġ0. Information collected is aggregated and anonymous.“Art is the illusion of spontaneity.” -Japanese proverbīeyond Hokusai’s Wave and Kusama’s dots, the ten most popular Japanese artists on Artsy reflect the country’s rich artistic tradition. These cookies enable us to provide better services based on how users use our website, and allow us to improve our features to deliver better user experience.
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