One year anniversary of my mother's passing in Osaka, June 2012

Cindy Sherman February 26–June 11, 2012

Cindy Sherman (American, b. 1954) is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential artists in contemporary art. Throughout her career, she has presented a sustained, eloquent, and provocative exploration of the construction of contemporary identity and the nature of representation, drawn from the unlimited supply of images from movies, TV, magazines, the Internet, and art history. Working as her own model for more than 30 years, Sherman has captured herself in a range of guises and personas which are at turns amusing and disturbing, distasteful and affecting. To create her photographs, she assumes multiple roles of photographer, model, makeup artist, hairdresser, stylist, and wardrobe mistress. With an arsenal of wigs, costumes, makeup, prosthetics, and props, Sherman has deftly altered her physique and surroundings to create a myriad of intriguing tableaus and characters, from screen siren to clown to aging socialite.

http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/exhibitions/1170 

--Cindy Sherman reminds me of a pop icon Madonna in terms of transforming herself so promptly with extraordinary determination while keeping herself perfectly under control. They both may be strong feminist women, but their art works are feminine Cliché.

 Well, I can't tell who Cindy Sherman is through her artworks since her works never talk about her own life, hidden under the mask, makeup, prop, costumes, or staged setting.

 I liked her groundbreaking series "Untitled Film Stills" (1977–80) best from this exhibition. I thought those B&W photographs are much much more creative and imaginative than her later works. I found "Cindy" appeared in her earlier works more natural, attractive and she seemed genuinely enjoy what she was doing. I wouldn't say I liked her color works in a large format. Those are too intense, forcible, repetitive, and confusing. Her most recent larger-than-life society portraits (2008) are carefully staged and fun to look at, but not as interesting as her earliest works.

 Besides, I liked so much of her collage and video works that she created while she was in college. The stop motion animation was surprisingly good. She might have taken a more different direction as a conceptual artist if she concentrated on more of this type of work. Unfortunately (or fortunately), her early photo work series seemed to get too much attention too soon.

Madonna hosted Sherman's 1997 show at the MoMA

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-galenson/the-unique-value-of-cindy_b_871803.html

The Unique Value of Cindy Sherman by David Galenson

"She has reclaimed the oldest trick in the book, storytelling, and given it new life in visual art. An amazing number of younger artists have followed her lead; the galleries are full of what has come to be called setup photography, in which complex and often highly enigmatic scenarios are plotted, constructed, and photographed, and much of the newer painting and sculpture on view these days has a strong narrative content." 

Cindy Sherman Doesn't Thrill Me

http://blog.stellakramer.com/2012/03/cindy-sherman-doesnt-thrill-me.html

Francesca Woodman at the Guggenheim

Francesca Woodman
March 16–June 13, 2012

http://www.berk-edu.com/RESEARCH/francescaWoodman/index.html#22 

 Francesca Woodman will be the first major American exhibition of this artist’s work in more than two decades, and the first comprehensive survey of her brief but extraordinary career to be seen in the United States. The retrospective will include more than 100 vintage photographs, many of which have never been exhibited, and includes several of the large-scale blueprints she created at the end of career, as well as the intimate black-and-white photographs for which she is best known. Now nearly thirty years since her death, the moment is ripe for a historical reconsideration of her work and its reception.

Born in 1958, Woodman’s oeuvre represents a remarkably rich and singular exploration of the human body in space, and of the genre of self-portraiture in particular. Her deep and personal interest in serial imagery, Surrealism, Conceptualist practice, and photography’s relationship to both literature and performance are also the hallmarks of the heady moment in American photography during which she came of age. This retrospective offers an occasion to examine more closely the maturation and expression of a highly subjective and coherent artistic vision. It also presents an important and timely opportunity to reassess a critical juncture in American photographic history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francesca_Woodman

--- She seemed to know what she wanted to create at the beginning of her brief career. At 15, she already had her style -- self-portraits in black & white photographic images using her own naked or half-dressed body staged props and posed inside of old ragged houses. She used medium format cameras with long exposure. The result was provocative, imaginative, innocent, sensual, fictitious, improvisational, biblical, symbolic, intense, effeminate, expressive, ethereal, and most of all, eccentric.

 She was born on April 3, 1958, in Denver, Colorado, and raised in a family of artists. In her youth, her family often spent in European cities. After she graduated from RISD in 1978, she went to NYC and became a fashion photographer. But soon, she returned to her fine art photographic works. On January 19, 1981, a few months after she finished a series of work, she committed suicide in NYC.

So her entire works were created between she was 15 to 22. She was unknown until her first major retrospective exhibition held at Hunter College gallery in 1986.

 When I entered her exhibition at the Guggenheim yesterday, I thought her works were similar to those of talented art students' thesis works. Like those emerging young artists at the beginning of their career full of promise, they were mostly interrupted with many reasons before fully blooming as mature artists. I wondered if her works were dramatized more than necessary because of her tragic end at the tender age of 22.

 Or because of the reason that she used her nude for image-making (rare in the '70s) captured attention.

 But I soon changed my mind. Some of the images were so interesting not because of the naked body's provocative use but because of the unique sensitivity in posing, props, lighting, and compositions. 

Some of the images were well-composed, almost look like the 17th-century Dutch paintings like Vermeers' who used a camera obscura. Some of them looked more contemporary abstract paintings. Looked spontaneous, casual, and improvisational but seemed to have careful eyes on composition. It was too bad that the artist didn't print those images into at least 30 x 30' in size. Most of them were way too small.

 And of course, it is too bad that she didn't live enough to mature as an artist. But how would her artworks have become if she had survived into her 50s? If her works relied on her youthful body and mind, how she could have changed her direction over the 30 years? Would she have used her own aging body over the years? Or she could have been like Sally Mann, who subjected her children for her art? Or she ended up as nobody who was an art prodigy once, sparked her talent only when she was young?

 After that, I felt like I knew someone like her in my art college days. A girl like her was so talented, fearless, and independent despite her young age. When the rest of us were following teachers' guidance submissively, she was absent from school and doing her work alone. She seemed ahead of life, and I admired her talent and independent mind. At the same time, I was envied and intimidated by her that I was so behind in maturity both as an artist and a woman. Yes, Francesca Woodman's works remembered me those a bit painful, sweet old days almost 30 years ago.

*Please visit https://www.artsy.net/artist/francesca-woodman
for over 70 of Woodman's works, bio, exclusive articles, and up-to-date Woodman exhibition listings.

Lost & Found: 3.11 Photographs from Tohoku

Lost & Found: 3.11 Photographs from Tohoku
http://www.aperture.org/events/detail.php?id=851

Monday, April 2, 2012–Friday, April 27, 2012
FREE
Aperture Gallery Project Room
547 West 27th Street, 4th Fl.
New York, New York
(212) 505-5555

Aperture Foundation presents Lost & Found: 3.11 Photographs from Tohoku, a profoundly moving exhibition of photographs recovered from the devastation following the earthquake and tsunami and the subsequent nuclear catastrophe that took place in the Tohoku region of Japan a year ago, last March.

--Those are actual family photos found in the Tsunami-hit areas. First I thought those were scanned copies created like actual photos found in the dirt. But no, they were real ones that traveled long way to New York from Northern Pacific coast in Japan.

At the time when I entered the Aperture Gallery Project Room, where all those photos were coated in transparent plastic folder and hanging all over the wall, I felt some strange energy. I could not tell that the energy I felt was positive or negative, but I could tell that those photos were somehow breathing in the gallery room.
I got this overwhelming feeling, so I couldn't stay there long.

I'm going back to Japan on June 1st for the one year anniversary of my mother's passing.

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - gallery shots#2

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - gallery shots

Recollections vol. 2, Tokyo, June 2011 - Reviewed at www.manafinearts.com

Review: Ceres Gallery
April 13, 2012
Masayo Nishimura: Recollections vol. 2, Tokyo, June 2011
 Ceres Gallery

By Tema Stauffer
http://www.manafinearts.com/the-mana-log/2012/04/review-ceres-gallery/

Vernita N’Cognita “Invisible Woman” Thursday, April 12, 7PM, at Ceres Gallery

Vernita N’Cognita
“Invisible Woman”

A performance artwork with Butoh Movement & Butoh Voice
To be presented Thursday, April 12, 7PM, at Ceres Gallery

Vernita Nemec AKA N’Cognita’s performances incorporate Butoh movement, a form of expressive, non-traditional dance that originated in the fifties and sixties among the Japanese avant-garde & now Butoh Voice created from her poetry. In recent years, she has been exploring aging and how our society, so focused on the beauty of youth, negatively perceives women as they age. “The Invisible Woman”, was developed in a residency at the North American Cultural Laboratory (NACL) awarded by The Field. In this work, she focuses with humor and angst on this dilemma all women who survive into their 60’s and beyond must endure.”

“…women become invisible
as they get older
I feel it already
tho I still feel quite young.
I walk down the street
and no one looks at me
like they used to…”

Vernita N’Cognita aka Vernita Nemec is a visual/ performance artist/ curator who has exhibited her art throughout the world. Her artwork ranges across a variety of disciplines, from creating installations, m/m collages and tangible art objects such as the “Endless Junkmail Scroll to the creation of performance art that conceptually investigates theatre and its edges – using language, space, and time, silence and stillness as well as movement and voice as an instrument of self-expression.

--Wonderful show with many audience, thank you Vernita.

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - opening reception 3/29/12

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - opening reception 3/29/12

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - March 27 - April 21, 2012

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Masayo Nishimura
Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011
Photography

March 27 - April 21, 2012
Opening Reception, Thursday, March 29th, 6pm - 8pm


Ceres gallery is pleased to present Masayo Nishimura’s Recollections vol.2;Tokyo, June 2011, a solo exhibition of Nishimura’s photographs. The Opening Reception will take place on Thursday, March 29th from 6pm until 8pm. The artist will be present.

This exhibition features Nishimura’s color photographs of various passersby almost all of which were captured in one sunny afternoon on the streets of Tokyo, Japan in June 2011.

For this project, Nishimura shot around Shinjuku Station--the busiest business and shopping area in Tokyo. However in her images, the pedestrians on the sidewalks and crosswalks appear strangely frozen in the middle of their action while they are moving their feet one step forward toward their destinations.
Some are captured while holding umbrellas, some are frozen while conversing with others or talking on cell phones, and some are caught while running hurriedly with long strides - all of these actions are momentary paused. Along with beaming sunlight and dark shadows cast on the ground, the scenes look surreal, fictitious and curiously soundless, even though the actual location is filled with traffic sounds and crowd noise.

In her sequential series of Scramble Crossing, Nishimura experiments with the consecutive shooting of people on a scramble crossing. During the brief period of time when the traffic signal changes from green to red, she captures various types of pedestrians as well as vehicles crossing in opposite directions. These paused frames and sequential images reveal interesting “raw” expressions of people in their facial and body language, which they are not normally conscious of. On the scramble, each person seems to tell his or her own personal story even though they appear frozen in time.

By using a wide-angle lens with fixed aperture and a relatively high shutter speed with no flash or tripod or close up shot, Nishimura was able to capture all of the images casually and spontaneously as a distant observer without interacting with her subjects. Her approach becomes a sampling of everyday life out on the streets.

An added bonus is that these everyday scenes often transform themselves into a unique expression and unexpectedly tell stories by themselves, as also exemplified by her previous NYC subway photographs.
* All the shots are taken with a 35 mm film camera with Fuji color film and hand-printed by the artist on her final stock of Kodak paper.

About Masayo Nishimura:
Masayo Nishimura is a native of Osaka, Japan. In 1986, she moved to New York to study dance. In 1993, she began her study of photography at CUNY Hunter College under Professor Mark Feldstein, where she discovered her visual interest in NYC subway stations. She also took several workshops at the School of Visual Arts & the International Center of Photography. Since then her subway-themed photographic works have been exhibited in various galleries in New York City.

In 2000, she started working on a series of color photographs dealing with the lights and shadows created by subway architecture. The work entitled Uptown Bound was first exhibited in September 2001 in New York City and has been receiving enthusiastic responses from viewers. In 2008 she returned to her native land and captured everyday scenes in the Tokyo subway. Those works was first exhibited in 2011 in an exhibition titled Recollections: From New York to Tokyo, which evoked responses from viewers as the transformation of an everyday scene into a unique expression. Currently she lives and works in New York City.

For more information please contact Stefany Benson, Director at:

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.

Tomorrow, March 11th marks the 1st anniversary of the Japan's Tōhoku earthquake & the tsunami.

Tomorrow March 11^th marks the 1st anniversary of the Japan's Tōhoku earthquake & the tsunami. As I wrote before, I was in Japan at that time, visiting my mother who was living in Osaka, Japan -- which was unaffected since it was located some 600 km west of the disaster area.

On the afternoon of Friday, March 11^th 2011, I went to the dentist office in a neighboring town by train. At 2:30 PM, I sat on the dentist's reclining chair and opened my mouth wide so that the doctor could drill a bad cavity in my right upper mauler tooth.

The doctor was a gentle person in his 70's and used extremely gentle approach. So, I knew that I didn't need to scream for pain but still, I was furious since I haven't visited any dentists for two decades (!).

When the doctor started drilling, I closed my eyes and just hoped the time would pass fast. Then about 15 minutes into the treatment, suddenly, he stopped drilling.
"Did you feel earthquake?"
He asked the nurse who was standing right beside him. The nurse replied,
"Yes, I did, a little bit."
Then doctor asked me.
"Did you feel that too?"
I said,
"No, I didn't feel anything but numb vibration in my mouth."
Then he smiled at me and returned to the treatment.

I left the office about an hour later and went to a nearby shopping mall. At late afternoon, the supermarket in the mall was filled with customers for grocery shopping -- lively and noisy as usual.

After the shopping, I took a bus and got home around 5 PM. As soon as I opened the door, my mother ran into me. She told me that the gigantic earthquake hit the northern Japan include Tokyo around three o'clock. The quake sent a massive Tsunami, which crashed, into the Pacific coast, wiped out entire towns and villages. In Tokyo, many buildings were burning out of control. Hundreds of people died or went missing. I hurried into the living room and watched the Tsunami scenes on TV, speechless with disbelief.

That earthquake occurred at 2:46 PM – exact time when my dentist felt tremors. The quake was a magnitude 8.9, the biggest earthquake to hit Japan since late 1800s. Tokyo was recorded as a magnitude upper 5 and it shook Osaka too - a magnitude 1.

Then I remember that I was scheduled to go to Tokyo the day after. The hotel was already booked for five nights.Tokyo is roughly 500 km to the north-east of Osaka, less than 3 hours travel by bullet train.

"You have to cancel the trip. Tokyo is too dangerous now."
Mother insisted. Confused, I was not sure what to do. I was thinking of the people whom I was supposed to meet there.
"I'll call them and decide tomorrow morning."
I told mother so, and two of us kept staring at TV the rest of the evening.

Soon all regular TV programs were canceled. Instead, special programs to report on what was going on in hard hit area were broadcast live. All the regular TV commercials disappeared too. (Because their contents were seen inadequate to the terrible situation.) That way continued for the next two weeks.

My mother was diagnosed with liver cancer a year ago and undergoing chemotherapy at that time. Her spirit was normal but it was obvious that she was weaker physically day by day besides loosing her hair from the therapy. She no longer had energy to go out for grocery shopping or walking her dog. However her mind was still fully functioning. She liked to read newspapers and watch news programs daily.

On that day, I remembered that my mother was worried so much of the possible Fukushima nuclear power plant melts down. She seemed excited when she saw the Japanese military helicopters dropping seawater onto the plant's reactor for cooling down. I myself was rather depressed facing too much sadness on papers and TV screens all day long.

So I decided to escape.

Originally, I had planned to take pictures of Kyoto area during this visit. Kyoto was just half an hour away from Osaka by bullet train. So, next couple of days, I took train and walked around tourist spots in Kyoto such as famous temples & shrines and photographed people there.

Early spring in Kyoto was so peacefully beautiful and totally unaffected by the disaster right happening in the northern Japan. Looking at those happy, care-free faces of tourists as well as residents who continued with their normal lives, I felt like I was living in a different dimension away from the other half of Japan islands ---- like Heaven & Hell.

Within the same week, I went to photograph the UFJ (Universal Studios Japan) amusement park in Osaka too. That was just five days after the disaster but the place was filled with fun-loving couples and families. I went the famous shopping arcade- Dotonbori too. Dotonbori is a home of ‘Kuidaore’ with various eateries and the famous giant signs such as moving crab, puffer fish, dragon, etc.( Kuidaore - a Japanese word meaning roughly “to ruin oneself by extravagance in food.”) The streets were packed with numerous gourmet restaurants, eateries and lively young tourists.

Then two weeks later, on Mrach 25^th, I finally went to Tokyo for five days and saw the reality. The capital city where I spent 8 years of my youth looked depressingly dark and empty. People seemed under great stress as they moved about in train stations and streets beneath traffic lights and advertising boards that had been switched off due to the power shortage. In station, some elevators, escalators and moving walkways also often turned off for saving energy policy.

Since many bars and restaurants cut short their business hours, many had to give up their nightlife too. Ginza – Tokyo’s answer to Champs-Elysées - the biggest and fanciest shopping area in Japan looked dark & empty too.

The people I met confessed how they were suffered from traumatic memory of a huge tremor set their buildings swaying wildly on March 11 and continuingly suffered from daily aftershock. Many people wore masks to avoid pollution, or allergy, or radiation, whatever… and their eyes seemed blank or wandering from fear, anxiety or fatigue. (I took street shots around Shinjuku stations and I couldn’t help but include those curiously masked people).

In Tokyo stores, I saw bottled waters were often sold out and vegetables produced in Fukushima prefectures were always left unsold. In station gates, there were various groups of charitable organizations holding donation boxes, standing and asking commuters for donation in aid to tsunami victims.

As I felt sorry to my people, I was scared too when I experienced a small tremor while I was staying at the hotel near Shinjuku. ( When I checked in, I made sure to ask the hotel employees for emergency evacuation plan.) The hotel was popular among foreign tourists, especially low-budget travelers. But that normally packed place looked empty too.

When I returned to Osaka five days later, I felt relieved as well as felt like that I returned to the different dimension of the Japan Island once again. In Osaka, everything seemed normal as usual.

On April 1^st, I took flight to JFK from Narita. As soon as I returned to NYC, I was overwhelmed by a very warm welcome of my American friends who were sincerely worried about me. Because many people here seemed genuinely believe that entire Japan was swallowed by Tsunami, I had to explain to them that the islands of Japan is so narrow and stretched long from north to south, so that the devastation in the northern Japan did not affect to the western area – my home town.

Since I returned, I have learned so much about radiation and realize there is much more to learn. I recognized that the radiation leaks problem at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant could not be able to solve so soon – probably would take forever. The disaster would not stay only in the Fukushima prefecture, but would might become the national (or international) disaster as the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl.

In May 25^th 2011, I returned to Japan once again to be with my mother in the terminal ward of the hospital. She passed on June 4^th. After the funeral and cleaning up of her house, I visited Tokyo again.

Three months after the disaster, thousands of evacuees in northern Japan were still living in temporary houses, while the area that had been directly struck will take years to redevelop. Even in Tokyo, some signs of abnormality were still obvious such as extinguished lighting of station names or the lack of air conditioning in train stations that had been turned off for scheduled power savings. On TV many programs were focusing on how to avoid immediate danger from radiation poisoning and Geiger counters were becoming popular household items for detecting radioactivity in local neighborhoods. In stores consumers carefully avoided purchasing vegetables or dairy products produced in hard hit prefectures.

But still, under the bright sunshine of June, I found that people in Tokyo were genuinely enjoying shopping and roaming happily about just like any other time. So by now, I believes in the strength of the Japanese people who remain undaunted by the havoc nature has wrecked on their homeland as they rebuild their nation step by step.

Now I'm out of paper

Yesterday, I used up all my remaining “Kodak Ektacolor Supra Endura Color Negative RC Glossy Paper, 16 x 20” at last. Now I'm officially out of paper.
Since Kodak announced it would stop manufacturing this paper at the end of 2009, the product became extremely hard to get since it disappeared from the stores very quickly. If I were lucky, I might be able to find expired papers at E-bay or other countries' auction sites... I just hope...

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011 - statement

Masayo Nishimura
Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011
Photography

This exhibition features Nishimura’s color photographs of various passersby almost all of which were captured in one sunny afternoon on the streets of Tokyo, Japan in June 2011.

For this project, Nishimura shot around Shinjuku Station--the busiest business and shopping area in Tokyo. However in her images, the pedestrians on the sidewalks and crosswalks appear strangely frozen in the middle of their action while they are moving their feet one step forward toward their destinations. Some are captured while holding umbrellas, some are frozen while conversing with others or talking on cell phones, and some are caught while running hurriedly with long strides - all of these actions are momentary paused. Along with beaming sunlight and dark shadows cast on the ground, the scenes look surreal, fictitious and curiously soundless, even though the actual location is filled with traffic sounds and crowd noise.

In her sequential series of “Scramble Crossing”, Nishimura experiments with the consecutive shooting of people on a scramble crossing. During the brief period of time when the traffic signal changes from green to red, she captures various types of pedestrians as well as vehicles crossing in opposite directions. These paused frames and sequential images reveal interesting “raw” expressions of people in their facial and body language which they are not normally conscious of. On the scramble, each person seems to tell his or her own personal story even though they appear frozen in time.

By using a wide-angle lens with fixed aperture and a relatively high shutter speed with no flash or tripod or close up shot, Nishimura was able to capture all of the images casually and spontaneously as a distant observer without interacting with her subjects. Her approach becomes a sampling of everyday life out on the streets. An added bonus is that these everyday scenes often transform themselves into a unique expression and unexpectedly tell stories by themselves, as also exemplified by her previous NYC subway photographs.

* All the shots are taken with a 35 mm film camera with Fuji color film and hand-printed by the artist on her final stock of Kodak paper.

Note about photography paper used for this exhibition

I have been using only a film camera and do all the printing from negatives by myself in a color darkroom. “Kodak Ektacolor Supra Endura Color Negative RC Glossy Paper, 16 x 20” - a photographic enlarging paper for manual printing made by Kodak - has been used for all of my works since beginning of my career. However, since Kodak announced it would stop manufacturing this paper at the end of 2009, the product became extremely hard to get since it disappeared from the stores very quickly.

By early 2010, I acquired 6 boxes (50 sheets per box) at several stores’ warehouses and this was the last remaining stock that I could find. By the spring of 2011, when I finished my 2011 February show at Ceres gallery, there were only three boxes left unused. Then by the summer of that year, I noticed that the remaining paper started showing some discoloration. The supposedly pure white paper was turning slightly yellowish white, which indicated that the expiration date had almost passed.

Around that time, the director of Ceres inquired about the possibility of my doing another show the following spring. I agreed to do so, not because I had enough new images to show but because I had the paper issue in my mind. I simply wanted to utilize my last remaining Kodak paper before it become completely unusable. So, I took the show’s slot and decided to utilize all the remaining Kodak paper for printing the images that I shot during my stay in Japan, June 2011. Therefore if a viewer at the exhibit notices that the paper used for this show shows subtle differences in shading, it is because of the above reason.

Besides the paper issue, it was difficult to find a decent color dark room since the industry is shrinking rapidly due to a significant decrease in clients. Since the lab where I frequently used past 6 years stopped maintaining equipment properly, I had to move to the much smaller but well maintained lab where young staffs & customers were always chatting so lively, playing music, just right next to the darkroom I was in…though the equipments were okay, I had hard times concentrating.

Anyway I still preferred to print my images for the show on my remaining Kodak paper in darkroom, rather than using another company’s product or changing to digital printing. In January 2012, while I was preparing for this show, Eastman Kodak filed for bankruptcy. I would just like to say thank you to the Kodak Company for having been the producer of my beloved paper and film with which I was able to achieve many creative goals, and also for their 131 years of incomparable dedication to the art of film photography.

Recollections vol.2; Tokyo, June 2011

Artist:
Masayo Nishimura

Show Title:
Recollections vol.2;Tokyo, June 2011
Photography

Show Date:
March 27 - April 21, 2012

Opening reception:
Thursday, March 29, 6pm - 8pm

Short Description:
This exhibition features Nishimura’s color photographs of various passers-by captured on busy Tokyo streets. With her spontaneous style that often freezes moments in time, the artist is able to transform an everyday scene into a unique expression, allowing the viewers to interpret as they see fit.
All the shots are taken with a 35 mm film camera and hand-printed by the artist on her final stock of Kodak paper.

"What matters now? — Proposals for a new front page" Exhibition at Aperture Gallery

http://aperture.org/whatmattersnow/2011/masayo-nishimura/

Masayo Nishimura's photograhs - "The Silver Car at the 79th Street Station I & II ("Uptown Bound" series)" are included in their "Public Wall" exhibition.

http://aperture.org/whatmattersnow/
http://aperture.org/whatmattersnow/about-what-matters-now/

Exhibition on view:
Saturday, September 17, 2011–Saturday, September 24, 2011

What should we be looking at? The extraordinary number of photographs taken on September 11 made it the most photographed event in history and may have signaled the birth of citizen journalism. However in our impulse to record, we have not formulated new strategies to a better understanding of today's pressing issues of a globalized world. There is no longer a "front page" to act as a societal filter through which, we can learn about important events and trends. Even the role that the physical café once played in our communities—the place we went to discuss and digest what's going on around us—has become fragmented across a myriad of virtual spaces.

Ten years post-9/11, at a time when we are more overloaded with information than ever but cannot access it in a coherent manner, Aperture will create a visual café for collective social engagement with the question: What Matter's Now? and turn it into an evolving exhibition space. During a two-week period Aperture will turn itself "inside out," letting participants engage in the editorial process of weighing questions, ideas, and images, and proposing conceptual and curatorial solutions. Both invited guests and gallery visitors will be asked to participate. The exhibition What Matters Now? Proposals for a New Front Page will combine the crowd sourcing of images and ideas with the curatorial engagement of six experienced individuals, each hosting a table and a conversation within the space, where on corresponding walls each group will present its proposals for the contents of a 'New Front Page'. Hosts include a variety of visual image specialists: Wafaa Bilal, Melissa Harris, Stephen Mayes, Joel Meyerowitz, Fred Ritchin (who conceptualized this project), and Deborah Willis.

As the exhibition opens, each of the six hosts will have a designated space, but the walls will be empty. Progressively throughout the first two weeks of the "exhibition," the walls will be filled in whatever manner each table decides. As the exhibition emerges, its contents will be posted online, daily, via a dedicated blog, as well as via Facebook and Twitter, at aperture.org/whatmattersnow and #whatmattersnow; allowing remote participants to respond and to create a seventh wall dedicated to ideas from the public.

Uptown Bound – 2006 show, press release (longer version)

The view from W.T.C Observation deck #1, 1994





Uptown bound

I began studying photography in 1993. From the beginning I was attracted to the lights and shadows created by subway architecture, especially the way the roofs of cars and tracks are bathed in light from the street. I always marveled at the effects so produced; they reminded me of Medieval religious paintings. Down in the station, I often felt as if I were inside of a huge fish tank, with blurry passengers and cars floating by in the depths. Illuminated by artificial light, everything looked quiet and detached from this reality. The lighting often created dreamlike shadows, sometimes creating ghostly effects. I was always fascinated with the surreal images created by this everyday environment.

I used a 35mm SLR camera for first couple of years. Then in fall 1999, I experimented with a rented Hasselblad with B & W film. Since that was a medium format camera and difficult to operate by hand, I set up a tripod on the platform with a cable release. Without a flashlight, instead I used a long exposure and a slow shutter speed in order to capture the transforming contours of shadows over time. I worked at the stations when they were relatively empty-- such as early mornings and on weekends, because I didn’t want to get unnecessary attention. Still, I was unaware of regulations prohibiting the use of tripods in stations.

In April 2000, I visited the station again with the same Hasselblad. I wanted to try color films this time. That was a sunny Sunday morning and I felt the lighting through the street level looked perfect. Just like I did before, I set up my tripod in the platform and started pressing the cable release. I continued to do so for about thirty minutes until a policeman interrupted me. That was the first time that I was ever interrupted in my shooting. I was disappointed, but the results of that half hour's work developed quite beautifully, and I felt quite blessed. The images I captured that morning were exhibited in a group show which opened at the SoHo Photo Gallery in Tribeca on Thursday, September 6th, 2001.

On the fifth day into the exhibition, Tuesday September 11th, I woke up late to see that the Twin Towers were already crushed by terrorists and had disappeared from the skyline. The world I lived in and loved for the past fourteen years had suddenly vanished. The gallery was located just a few blocks away from the WTC. The show had to be temporarily closed due to circumstances shutting off everything in Manhattan south of 14th street.

On Saturday the 15th, I visited the gallery to make sure that everything was okay. I got off the subway at 14th Street and started walking on 6th avenue, headed downtown. The skyline without the World Trade Center seemed shockingly vast and empty. The gallery itself was unaffected but the area around it was filled with dust and debris. The smell of the burning buildings was still so unbearably strong that my eyes were irritated and it was hard for me to breathe. Though the show reopened briefly by the last week of the September, the visitors were, as one would expect, few. Still I had hoped some people would stop by to enjoy the artworks for a moment, no matter how tragic the world had turned.

While the city was struggled to recover, subway cars started displaying American flags as a symbol of patriotism. Soon "The War against Terrorism" began, which was extended to war in Iraq. The world grew fearful of terrorist threats and train stations became a target--a station in Madrid was bombed in 2003, London had a bombing in its system in 2005. Homeland security in New York City grew more tightened than ever. The New York City Transit tried, unsuccessfully, to ban all photography in subways, citing "security concern."

To my friends' surprise, I did care less about the news since I no longer wanted to photograph subway stations. I stopped taking pictures in the subway not because I was afraid of breaking regulations, but because I just didn't feel like going back to the place that once so freely sparked my creative imagination. Nurtured by an artist-friendly atmosphere for years, the entire city let me be absorbed in my creative works. The city had lost its innocence in the aftermath of the attacks, and I was wondering if my faith in my home was dissolving as well. If I were a documentary photographer, I could have continued for journalistic purposes. But I was a fine art photographer. So, I decided to do something else rather than taking photos in the subways.

For the last four years, my subway photos were in my closet, hidden from the public. I had a strange feeling that it might have been inappropriate to show them. I felt as if it might be better to keep my subway photos unseen until the world was be peaceful and secure again. I had no idea when that would happen, though--probably not in my lifetime. Then, recently I took a second look at those archived photos. The neatly printed and framed pictures still looked quite fresh and beautiful. While looking at them, I remembered the chaotic time when those were last exhibited. I thought I should give them another chance to be seen.

So, here they are. I am finally able to show my subway photographs to the public again. These works remind me of the innocence of New York City before 9/11, the city I've loved so dearly since I moved here two decades ago.

Masayo Nishimura

Fall, 2006

Uptown Bound – First & Another 10th Anniversary

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Masayo Nishimura
Uptown Bound – First & Another 10th Anniversary
Photography

September 8 – 16, 2011
At: Gallery 502a
Address: 526 W. 26th St., bet. 10th & 11th Ave. 5th floor, Studio 502a

Hours: 7 days a week, 2 pm – 7 pm, including Sunday Sept. 11th & Monday Sept. 12th.
*Thursday Sept. 8th will open at 5 pm, Friday Sept. 16th will close at 5 pm

*There is no opening reception, however the artist will be present in the gallery every day during open hours.
For more information, please call: 646-761-2043
E-mail: gallery502a@gmail.com

Gallery 502a is pleased to present Masayo Nishimura’s Uptown Bound, the artist’s fourth solo exhibition of her photographic works under the same title. Uptown Bound is a series of color photographs dealing with the lights and shadows created by New York City subway architecture, in which the roofs of cars and tracks are bathed in light from the street level, looking quiet, beautiful, and reminiscent of medieval religious paintings. Since Uptown Bound was first exhibited in September 2001 in New York City, it has been exhibited in various galleries including the Abrons Arts Center, Henry Street Settlement in 2008, and has been receiving enthusiastic responses from viewers, especially from people living in the city.

Nishimura began studying photography in 1993. From the beginning she was attracted to the lights and shadows created by subway architecture, especially the way the cars and tracks are bathed in light from the street. She always marveled at the effects produced. Down in the station, Nishimura often felt as if she were inside a huge fish tank, with blurry passengers and cars floating by in the depths. Illuminated by artificial light, everything looked quiet and detached from reality. The lighting often created dreamlike shadows, sometimes creating ghostly effects. Nishimura was always fascinated with those surreal images.

In fall 1999, Nishimura experimented for the first time with a rented Hasselblad and B & W film. Since it was a medium format camera and difficult to operate by hand, she installed a tripod with cable release on the platform. Instead of using a flash, she used a long exposure and a slow shutter speed to capture the transforming contours of shadows over time. Then in April 2000, Nishimura visited the station again with the same Hasselblad, this time using color film. It was a bright Sunday morning and she felt as if the lighting from the street level looked ideal. Just as she had done before, she set up her tripod on the platform and pressed the cable release. Nishimura continued to press the cable release for about thirty minutes until a policeman interrupted her. The results of that half- hour's work developed quite beautifully and she felt blessed.

The images Nishimura captured that morning were first exhibited in a solo show, which opened at the SoHo Photo Gallery in Tribeca on Thursday, September 6th, 2001. On the fifth day into the exhibition, Tuesday September 11th, she woke up late to see that the Twin Towers were already crushed by terrorists and had disappeared from the skyline. The gallery was located just a few blocks away from the WTC. The show had to be temporarily closed due to circumstances shutting off everything in Manhattan south of 14th street.

While the city was struggling to recover, subway cars started displaying American flags as a symbol of patriotism. Soon The War against Terrorism began, which was extended to war in Iraq. The world grew fearful of terrorist threats and train stations became a target, and homeland security in New York City grew more tightened than ever. The tense condition has not improved much over the decade. Now these photographic works remind her of the innocence of New York City before 9/11, the city Nishimura has loved so dearly since she moved here two decades ago.

This exhibition marks the 10th anniversary of the works since those were first exhibited in the middle of the chaotic time that changed New Yorkers lives including the artist herself forever.

About Masayo Nishimura:

Masayo Nishimura is a native of Osaka, Japan. In 1986, she moved to New York to study dance. In 1993, she began her study of photography at CUNY Hunter College under Professor Mark Feldstein, where she discovered her visual interest in NYC subway stations. She also took several workshops at the School of Visual Arts & the International Center of Photography. Since then her subway-themed photographic works have been exhibited in various galleries in New York City.

In 1996, while continuing her study of photography, she also started learning computer art at the School of Visual Arts and completed her Master of Fine Arts degree in 1999. Her thesis animation film, "Dream" – a subway love story has been screened worldwide and has won various awards including New York regional finalist of the 27th Student Academy Awards. In 2000 "Dream" was screened at the Museum of Modern Art as an official selection of the "New Directors/New Films Festival" sponsored by the Cinema Society of Lincoln Center and MOMA.
In 2000, she started working on a series of color photographs dealing with the lights and shadows created by subway architecture. The work entitled “Uptown Bound” was first exhibited in September 2001 in New York City and has been receiving enthusiastic responses from viewers. In 2008 she returned to her native land and captured everyday scenes in the Tokyo subway. Those works was first exhibited in 2011 in an exhibition titled "Recollections: From New York to Tokyo" which evoked responses from viewers as the transformation of an everyday scene into a unique expression. Currently she lives and works in New York City.
For more information please contact Masayo Nishimura:

Masayo Nishimura:
mniart@aol.com
https://ceresgallery.org/?page_id=1091

Hiroshima 66th Anniversary: Thoughts Of Fukushima Nuclear Plant Cloud Ceremonies

Japan's annual commemorations of the Aug. 6, 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima were particularly poignant this year, with thoughts quickly turning to those living near the Fukushima Nuclear Plant left crippled by the devastating March earthquake and tsunami.

As the Japan Times is reporting, many Hiroshima survivors and family members expressed solidarity with Fukushima victims during ceremonies on the eve of the 66th anniversary. "Nobody knows the fear and uncertainty Fukushima residents face over radiation levels better than the people of Hiroshima," 68-year-old Setsuko Kumazaki, who lost several relatives in Hiroshima, is quoted as saying.

As the Wall Street Journal reports, this year’s speech by Mayor Kazumi Matsui -- scheduled after a minute-long silence at 8:15 a.m., the time when the U.S. dropped a four-ton uranium bomb in the final days of World War II -- has been much anticipated because he is the city’s first mayor born after 1945, and the son of an A-bomb survivor. A U.S. representative is scheduled to attend the ceremony for the first time, the BBC reports.

Meanwhile, Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has vowed to scale back the nation's reliance on nuclear power and make more use of solar energy and other renewable power sources.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/05/hiroshima-anniversary-fukushima-nuclear-plant_n_919529.html#s323248

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---In the summer of 1945, my father was a 20 year old soldier whose troop was stationed near Hiroshima.

On August 7th, the day after the Hiroshima bombing, his troop was ordered to go to the ruined city for relief activities. He ended up staying in the middle of aftermath for 10 days for picking up a tremendous number of unidentified bodies and cremating them in various spots such as school yards and railroad tracks.

While he was staying there, he took food & water anything available, and at night he dig a hole in the wet ground to sleep in it. Soon many of his fellow soldiers started having mysterious sickness includes diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, headaches, etc - that became clear later as a “Radiation sickness” or “Acute Radiation Syndrome.”

Surprisingly, my father did not suffer seriously from those radiation sickness. Considering he was sickly skinny young man who barely passed the physical exam for conscription, that was miracle. Next 60 years of his life, he was basically fine owing largely to my mother's strict dietary management. But he had never forgotten what he saw there. Once I was about 12, he drew a picture and explained to us about what he actually saw there, very graphically. That was a shocking experience to any children and he did not do the same thing never again.

About the time when he was turning 80, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. It was hard to say whether or not his cancer was caused from the incident that he spent 10 days in Hiroshima 60 years earlier. However, according to mother, just a few months before he died at the age of 84, he applied to the Japanese government to issue him an official certificate of A-bomb victims (Hibakusha Techo).

I didn't know but indeed those people who worked for rescuing duties right after the bombing were included as the eligible recipients. But why he wanted to do so at the nearly end of his life? For money? He was a well-to do businessman who hardly needed financial support from the government. I guess, probably he wanted to convince himself before leaving this life, that his illness came from having been there, working for his own country.