Seen: Ariphoto vol.30
Who: 有元伸也 Shinya Arimoto / website
Where: Totem Pole Photo Gallery, Shinjuku
When: September 19 - October 1, 2017. Open 12 - 7pm, closed Mondays
In conversation yesterday with Arimoto he mentioned that from a young age he’s always been an tenacious reader of manga- becoming a comic artist was his dream in elementary school- he said that influence probably filters through into his pictures. His take on the work convincing in how this exhibition in particular was sequenced- it opens with a cartoonish landscape and slowly all kinds of individuals- I refuse to call subjects of street photography “characters”- - circulate through the frames. Surreality, through dress, costume, or situational happenstance, is a major facet of his work.
Fans of Arimoto’s photography will be please to hear that he’s published an eighth volume of his popular self-published Ariphoto zine series- copies will be available on his website once the exhibition has ended.
Speaking of photobooks- I hear that copies of Arimoto’s book Tokyo Circulation are running low- the sooner you get your copy, the better. You can order it from shashasha here.