Japan - Bodies, Memories, Visions

The Trieste exhibition presents over 80 works including photographs and videos created by 16 contemporary Japanese artists: Asakai Yoko, Hayashi Noriko, Ishikawa Naoki, Kai Keijiro, Kawauchi Rinko, Momose Aya, Nagashima Yurie, Nomura Sakiko, Shimonishi Susumu, Sato Tokihiro, Sugimoto Hiroshi, Suzuki Risaku, Suzuki Ryoko, Tomoko Yoneda, Miyagi Futoshi and Yokota Daisuke.

The exhibition is structured around three thematic cores—Memory and Identity, Body and Bodies, Reality and Vision—offering a broad and nuanced overview of the current Japanese photography and video scene.

The works on display bring together internationally recognized masters and the research of new generations, committed to reinterpreting Japan's recent history, questioning gender issues, everyday life, and the use of the body as a political tool.

As curator Filippo Maggia observes, Japanese photography, recognized since the 1930s as one of the most important schools on an international level and also established in the early years of the new millennium with authors such as Hiroshi Sugimoto, Nobuyoshi Araki and Daido Moriyama, is today undergoing a phase of generational renewal.

This change marks a progressive approach to Western themes and sensibilities.

While Japanese photography often developed a strongly identitarian and self-referential language during the twentieth century, many contemporary artists now take as a reference not only the complexity of their own national context but also global changes, establishing a dialogue with issues such as collective memory, social relations, the environment, image perception, and gender identities.

In the Memory and Identity section, Noriko Hayashi and Tomoko Yoneda reread crucial events in recent Japanese history through a documentary and participatory approach.

Susumu Shimonishi reflects on the continuity and fractures of the past through zenithal shots and moving images that become a measure of time. Naoki Ishikawa, a student of Daido Moriyama, recounts daily life on the Okunoto Peninsula, suspended between tradition and marginality.

The celebrations and rituals that define the country's cultural fabric emerge in Keijiro Kai's photographs, while Miyagi Futoshi's videos investigate personal memory and the construction of gender identity through an intimate narrative of memories and relationships.