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This summer I had an internship at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, and I was able to see the exhibition "Shomei Tomatsu: Skin of the Nation." This exhibition was a retrospective of the work of the Japanese photographer Shomei Tomatsu, who is well established in Japan but is still very much unknown in the United States. I was really moved by Tomatsu's photographs. Not only are they aethestically striking, but their powerful and moving subject matter is what most defines them and give them their unique character. Tomatsu was born in 1930 in Nagoya, Japan, and throughout his childhood and early adulthood, he witnessed many of the catastrophic events in Japan's history, most notably the deadly invasions of World War II. Tomatsu's photographs depict the Japanese nation, including its people, its move toward industrialization, its violence, and especially its transformation into a Westernized nation. Tomatsu often deals with this issue of Westernization, and he shows the sometimes devestating effects that Westernization had on Japanese culture. Tomatsu's photographs serve as a documentation of Japan's tumultous history in the 20th century. These images are for me what constitutes photography. They are docuemtary and realistic. They capture the people, places, and objects of a nation, and they create visual reminders of the past that will forever be a part of the future. | This summer I had an internship at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, and I was able to see the exhibition "Shomei Tomatsu: Skin of the Nation." This exhibition was a retrospective of the work of the Japanese photographer Shomei Tomatsu, who is well established in Japan but is still very much unknown in the United States. I was really moved by Tomatsu's photographs. Not only are they aethestically striking, but their powerful and moving subject matter is what most defines them and give them their unique character. Tomatsu was born in 1930 in Nagoya, Japan, and throughout his childhood and early adulthood, he witnessed many of the catastrophic events in Japan's history, most notably the deadly invasions of World War II. Tomatsu's photographs depict the Japanese nation, including its people, its move toward industrialization, its violence, and especially its transformation into a Westernized nation. Tomatsu often deals with this issue of Westernization, and he shows the sometimes devestating effects that Westernization had on Japanese culture. Tomatsu's photographs serve as a documentation of Japan's tumultous history in the 20th century. These images are for me what constitutes photography. They are docuemtary and realistic. They capture the people, places, and objects of a nation, and they create visual reminders of the past that will forever be a part of the future. | ||
~Kristin Schmehl | |||
Revision as of 01:40, 5 September 2005
This summer I had an internship at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, and I was able to see the exhibition "Shomei Tomatsu: Skin of the Nation." This exhibition was a retrospective of the work of the Japanese photographer Shomei Tomatsu, who is well established in Japan but is still very much unknown in the United States. I was really moved by Tomatsu's photographs. Not only are they aethestically striking, but their powerful and moving subject matter is what most defines them and give them their unique character. Tomatsu was born in 1930 in Nagoya, Japan, and throughout his childhood and early adulthood, he witnessed many of the catastrophic events in Japan's history, most notably the deadly invasions of World War II. Tomatsu's photographs depict the Japanese nation, including its people, its move toward industrialization, its violence, and especially its transformation into a Westernized nation. Tomatsu often deals with this issue of Westernization, and he shows the sometimes devestating effects that Westernization had on Japanese culture. Tomatsu's photographs serve as a documentation of Japan's tumultous history in the 20th century. These images are for me what constitutes photography. They are docuemtary and realistic. They capture the people, places, and objects of a nation, and they create visual reminders of the past that will forever be a part of the future. ~Kristin Schmehl
