Toshio Matsumoto, For the Damaged Right Eye
“For a New World to Come” thoroughly explores 1970s Japanese photography that both changed and influenced the formation of art in Japan. Co-presented by NYU Grey Gallery and the Japan Society Gallery, the exhibition features 29 of the most influential Japanese artists of the Seventies and highlights the execution of the camera to experiment and shift artistic practices of the time, through photographs, books, paintings, sculptures, media-based installations and even personal journals from the artists. The works exhibited reflect a period of political, social and economic turbulence in Japan. The constant feeling of uncertainty that loomed over the Japanese artists inspired them to react and document their emotions through the lens of a camera. The curator of the exhibition, Dr Yasufumi Nakamori, seamlessly brings this vast collection together to demonstrate the power that photography played in the formation of conceptual art.
Daido Moriyama, Asahi Camera
Toshio Matsumoto’s experimental film “For the Damage Right Eye” sets the scene for the show as a whole and illuminates the social turmoil slowly generating in the early 1960s. While Daido Moriyama’s distressed and blurry photographs of car accident aftermaths from his series “Accident” (1969) slowly reveal the breakdown of the traditional use of photography and even more so, traditional Japanese values. The photographs were part of Moriyama’s monthly magazine Asahi Camera, which are also on view as well.
Keiji Uematsu, Vertical Position
The show goes on to highlight artists that used the photography to explore both time and space. Hitoshi Nomura’s earliest work “Tardiology” comprises a 28ft tall cardboard sculpture destined to collapse. Nomura documented this process by photographing the collapse and breakdown over a period of time. His mix of performance, sculpture and photography propelled artists to study the way in which they produce works. Another major highlight of the exhibition was the recreation of artist Keiji Uematsu’s site-specific installation “Cutting” (1971), the work is shown with three enormous photographs from 1972 that Uematsu took while documenting himself performing within the installation. The recent re-installation of the site-specific piece “Cutting”, truly highlighted the importance that performance plays within the overall exhibition.
Miyako Ishiuchi, Apartment
Contrasting elements add an emotional edge to the show and paint a realistic and vivid picture of that era. Miyako Ishiuchi’s photography series “Apartments” documents post-occupation tenements, aiming to shed light on the dismal socio-political climate during Japan’s mourning; while Nobuyoshi Araki’s hand-made books display intimate moments between the artist and his wife on their honeymoon.
Nobuyoshi Araki, Sentimental Journey
Shomei Tomatsu, Protest
These artists contributed to the development of a new Japanese identity by re-examining its past, and “For a New World to Come” exemplifies how simultaneously that’s triggered Japanese conceptual art to emerge as an extremely important form of expression within the global context.
Text by Jessica Steller
“For a New World to Come: Experiments in Art and Photography, 1968-1979” is at NYU Grey Gallery until 5 December 2015, and at the Japan Society Gallery until 10 January 2016
More: Sharing is Scary: AYR Probe the Commodification of the Private