Seen: 新宿2014‐2015冬 / Shinjuku 2014-2015 Winter
Who: Shinji Abe
Where: 3rd District Gallery, Shinjuku
When: Jan. 27 - Feb. 8, 2014 open 13:00-20:00 daily
In his statement on the show, Abe writes that he’s seeing how the upcoming 2020 Tokyo Olympics has began to affect the city, something that has even begun creeping into places like Shinjuku’s rougher Kabukicho red-light district. As things began to disappear, he says he’s out to keep in photographs what he sees now in the present.
16 pictures make up the show- 16x20 is a great, if not perfect, size for 35mm film shots to be printed.
Seriously, look at the past few shows at 3rd District- Haruto Hoshi, Keizo Motoda, Tetsuo Morita, Kei Shimane, Karou Seki- Not to mention the crew at Totem Pole- Shinya Arimoto, Dan Epthorp, Kohei Hirose, and myself.
Photographers like use out in life like this with our cameras and black and white film- it’s a way to live but make no mistake, these little Shinjuku street-photo galleries we show at are far off the radar and consideration from the serious Art world. They don’t make money, either. In any official non-internet sense “Street Photography” is DEAD but I reckon in a few decades this kind of stuff will have get the proper recognition it deserves, or at least be appreciated better than most of what’s Art now.
And don’t get me started on publication of pictures like these (shot in Japan, anyway)- out of worry of causing trouble with readers no publisher is willing to take a risk to publish contemporary street photography. I actually know a guy who is set to do a book of his street work, but only on the condition that he and the publisher wait five years before it’s published. The glory days are long gone- ignored or simply held in disdain by the Art World and denied by publishers, Japanese street photographers might enjoy a line from US Marine Chesty Puller when surrounded by ten Chinese divisions in Korea: "Those poor bastards, they’ve got us right where we want them. We can fire in any direction now!"
While that might be an overdramatic quote to pull out, these photographers are showing dedication through self-published books and artist-run exhibition spaces- Outlets work as artillery pieces that fire off the explosive rounds/pictures that Abe and the other 3rd District members make.