Daido Moriyama is recognised as one of Japan’s most influential living photographers; he is certainly the most celebrated photographer to emerge from the Japanese Provoke movement of the 1960s. The selection presents a comprehensive oversight of Moriyama’s wide ranging subject matter, from well known images to lesser known surprises and titles include Memory of Dog 2, 1982; DOCUMENTARY 93 (‘86.6 Setagaya-ku, Tokyo), 1986; The City I Always Had a Hard Time Leaving, 1976 and One More Peek, 1966.

Notoriously challenging and unsettling, Moriyama’s work is both raw and instinctive, haunted by the American occupation of Japan during World War II and its consequent aftermath; the social and cultural shifts, industrialisation, urbanisation and ultimately the clash of capitalism with a traditionally insular society. His work alludes to the struggle between old and new, the emotional imbalance between two worlds and the urban malaise of Japan, chronicling the relentless tug of tradition versus modernism; spirituality versus commerce.

In addition to social and historical context, Moriyama draws influences from a range of photographers and artists both within and beyond Japan. He worked under Eikoh Hosoe and is a contemporary of Shomei Tomatsu, Nobuyoshi Araki and Hiroshi Sugimoto. The influence of Andy Warhol is evident as is the stimulus of Ed van der Elsken and William Klein, both of whom visited Japan in the early sixties.

His work, often stripped of sentimentality, depicts a dark, urgent and disturbing edge of street life and political protest – from corpses preserved in formaldehyde to urban decay, junkyards, consumer goods stacked in supermarkets, transvestite performers, city life, stray dogs and images of young women at hostess bars. A world without apparent joy.

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Din comunicatul de presă al expoziţiei Daido Moriyama: Silkscreens.

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Din cele 16 fotografii selectate pentru expoziţia lui Moriyama la Hamiltons Gallery din Londra, 8 pot fi văzute mai jos. Expoziţia este deschisă până în 20 decembrie 2013, 13 Carlos Place.

Documentary 93, 1986

Provoke no. 3, 1969

The City I Always Had a Hard Time Leaving, 1976

Memory of a Dog, 1982

Buenos Aires, 2005

One More Peek, 1966

KARIUDO (Hunter), 1972

Tokyo, 2001

Toate fotografiile sunt semnate de Daido Moriyama.

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