Seen: 荒木経惟 写狂老人A ARAKI Nobuyoshi Photo-Crazy A
Who: Nobuyoshi Araki
Where: Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery
When: July 8th - September 3rd, 2017 (11am-7pm / 1200 yen entry fee)
Nine different and very recent series make up this wild show by Nobuyoshi Araki- this is (until the TOP Museum’s show) the largest of Araki’s shows in Tokyo this summer. Upon paying the 1200 yen entry fee, the viewer is first thrust into a hallway lined by larger-than-life silver gelatin prints from Araki’s Erotic Housewives series. Right away scale and quantity come into play- this theme carries over into the other rooms and is a unifying element to the show. The venue’s high ceilings and perfect lighting make for a sharp canvas on which Araki’s work is taped- per his presentation style, there no frames here. Along with prints on walls there’s also a table of books and two slideshows in side rooms, too. Visitors pass a long hall with cases containing selected photobooks spanning the entirety of his career. (Twenty-five more photos of the exhibition can be seen on Fashion Snap, here.)
Accompanying this show is a 250+ page exhibition catalogue, as well as T-shirts, postcards, posters, folding fans, canvas bags, and a half a gift shop full of his photobooks.
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Exhibiting over 1000 prints in one show is exactly what being Photo-Crazy is all about. It’s even crazier to know they were almost all shot within the past two years. (Earlier this year I heard Araki say he shoots 10 to 15 rolls of film a day.)
To think that sounds like too many pictures for one show would be missing the point- what most would think is “too many” is, in Araki’s case is, where the fun starts- where life is lived, and where the meaning lies.