Photo exhibition by Izuru TAKEYA   

“Many hours have passed. When I look back on those times, I feel as if I can understand a little more about the meaning of the time that has been placed upon them. I have walked and pressed the shutter while expecting something that is unexpected and the incalculable. There is a sense of various movements being reset, and a refreshing by smell. One day, an early morning in a mountain village, the sky keeps changing its expression, morning dew on a spider's web, a raccoon being hit by a car, dots moving slowly in the high sky. The sensation of being surrounded and enveloped by multitudinous gods, with the flickering of the atmosphere and the shifting of the light on your skin, is like a feeling that activates every cell in your body. I feel as if these sensations supported my urge to see new things. Start walking and roaming around, and you will be able to find something someday.” (Afterword from the photobook)

With the cooperation of various people, I have been able to gather the photographs and published new photobooks this time. It contains photography take at each of the 47 prefectures in Japan that were not included in “Wandering in Japan” (2017) and “Shadow Thief” (2020). They are personal and universal, realistic and abstract, old and new…. I have selected 500 photographs with reminiscing back to the smell of the land in my mind. We hope you will take a look at them.

For this exhibition, I will be exhibiting prints of images selected from “Eyes on the Move 1990-2023”, using the technique known as Brom Oil, which was used in the early 1900s. This is one of my attempts to use various classical alternative photographic printing processes that I have been working on for the past 10 years, and I became interested in it when I saw Nakaji YASUI's exhibition last year. The metallic silver part in gelatin silver prints has been removed by bleaching, and oil-based ink has been applied onto the remaining hardened gelatin. The degree of hardening causes the ink to adhere differently, and when the ink is dipped in water, the repulsive action of the water and oil causes the image to appear. I hope you enjoy the unique texture of the prints.

Izuru TAKEYA