My Old ‘New Town’ – Recollections Vol.3 April 26 - May 21, at Ceres Gallery

Masayo Nishimura
My Old ‘New Town’ – Recollections Vol.3
Photography        

April 26 - May 21, 2016
Opening Reception, Thursday, April 28th, 6pm - 8pm

Ceres Gallery is pleased to present Masayo Nishimura’s solo exhibition, My Old ‘New Town’ – Recollections Vol.3. The artist will be present at the opening reception on Thursday, April 28th, from 6pm until 8pm.

This exhibition features color photographs that Nishimura shot in her hometown, Senri New Town located just north of Osaka City. The town was the first of the “New Towns”—large-scale residential satellite towns designed by the government throughout Japan in the ’60s.  It was developed in the hilly, wooded land adjacent to the 1970 Osaka Expo - the first world exposition held in Asia.

With its posh single family homes, neat apartment complexes, parks, schools, shopping centers, and tree-lined roads, from the start Senri New Town attracted many young families with children. Fifty years later, however, the town’s population now has a high proportion of senior citizens and very few children. Scores of houses stand vacant. In order to regenerate the community, re-development is the major issue in New Towns everywhere.  As Nishimura began returning to the town after her parents passed away a few years ago, she noticed this transformation and started to document the many faces of this aging “model city.”

In this series, Nishimura focuses on capturing the broader, everyday look of the town. This includes the “pedestrians only” road marker standing next to a school zone sign, both erected beside a single family home; the election campaign poster board standing alone under a pile of autumn leaves; a group of seniors playing Gateball—a croquet-like sport—at a children’s playground; a girl reading a book while crossing a long footbridge overlooking high-rise office buildings; and shoppers roaming a gigantic outdoor mall while a handful of children play in small recreation space.

Each of Nishimura’s images looks ordinary at first glance. Yet they are somehow otherworldly and eerily quiet, even when the photograph reflects the seemingly mundane or teems with a crowd. There is also a sense of irony in the images, such as shopping malls whose modern architecture and sheer scale overshadow and overpower scattered human figures. It looks as if people are frozen while gazing with uncertainty into the unknown.

As in her previous work, including of the New York City subway, Nishimura captures these images casually and spontaneously: a distant observer who does not interact with her subjects. These everyday scenes transform themselves into a unique expression and unexpectedly tell stories by themselves, revealing Nishimura’s ability to uncover the unseen in city life.


For more information please contact:

Ceres Gallery
547 West 27th St Suite 201 New York, NY 10001

phone: 212-947-6100
fax: 212-202-5455

art@ceresgallery.org
http://ceresgallery.org/

Hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 12pm - 6pm and Thursday 12-8pm.

Masayo Nishimura:
mniart@aol.com
http://multisoup.com