2023, June 7th – June 30th
―Distance of mind―
Hiroyo Kaneko: I say, “Sing a song” and then take a picture.
Daisuke Yokoyama: Photographing beyond the barrier of stuttering.
Ayaka Yamamoto: Photographing where conversation is impossible due to foreign language.
For about three years, human society was losing its “language” due to the use of masks during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The act of taking a picture of a person results from “fate.” Fate comes about due to karma associated with mind, body and spirit. The distance between self and other—whether it be as one who calls out, as one who is bewildered, or as one who cannot establish a conversation—rely far more on mutual understanding of hearts, than on physical distance. Communication start with the reflection of the weeds within one’s own body in the mind in of another person and ends in a kind of culmination with a photograph.
Is the finished photograph really yours? Is subject yours? Or did the photograph manage to capture the truth of the other person, as it is said photography can do?
The “phenomenon of existence” of the photographer, “the phenomenon of action” of photographing, and “the phenomenon of action” seen by the viewer are but transient phenomena that are not constant nor experienced in the same way between self and other. Photography may be merely a technology of materialization of a results-oriented approach but since work made by people is different from AI, it is impossible to ignore the background and process of a photograph.
Once you think about photography in this way, what underlies the photographer, the subject and the viewer is the Light of the destiny of the heart, and the questions underlying that path towards destiny which expresses itself through the “photograph.” It may be that ultimately all photographs seek to capture the Other. Therefore, a photograph is a gift that can only be created with the Other.
In this exhibition, the three photographers express microcosms of human relationships. The viewer will not merely sit on the sidelines but will ultimately reflect on their own hearts. “Everything is made with the heart.” I invite you to return to this foundational belief of Buddhism and in a solitary space, ponder the journey that seeks to understand the distance between hearts./Kurenboh