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Naoya Hatakeyama
Limestone landscapes and architecture reminiscent of lunar surfaces and prehistoric scenes; a vertical progression from the air down into the depths of a city sewer system; detonations in quarries. The architecturally and archeologically motivated photographic works of Naoya Hatakeyama explore these constructions and others, in serial works that display a rigor and overall consistency, dealing alternately with horizontal and vertical principles. This publication is the first comprehensive monograph devoted to Hatakeyama, covering all of his serial works as well as his most recent projects, realized in England.
132 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2002
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 2, 2017
I've wanted to read/look at this book for years. Well, not precisely this book but fortunately it includes the Underground photograph series I wanted to see as well as several others which are very cool.
Hatakeyama's aesthetic is simpatico with my own.
Hatakeyama's aesthetic is simpatico with my own.
August 8, 2012
The superb exhibit I saw of Hatakeyama's work at SF MOMA was entitled "Natural Stories" and had it's own catalog, but that catalog is unfortunately not listed on Good Reads.
Hatakeyama impressed me more than any photographer I've been newly introduced to in a long time. His work is all about the "concept of nature," which should not be confused with "nature" itself. Like many others, he is obsessed with the relationship between human-built structures and their natural surroundings. But unlike the majority of artists who tackle such themes Hatakeyama utterly rejects the notion of "nature vs. civilization." He instead understands civilization, that is to say humanity, as just another manifestation of "nature." "Nature," as a binary-partner to "civilization," is thus made meaningless in Hatakeyama's lens.
Great hills are made from mining dust. Sewers are made to constitute the most impressive "natural" caves. The peaks and valleys of great metropolises are visually equated with the topographies of subterranean catacombs.
All this leads to a meditation on Hatakeyama's home-town, which was devastated by the 2011 tsunami. Sixty art-photographs of utter ruin, of post-apocalyptic abandonment, are juxtaposed with a digital slide show of sixty of Hatakeyama's vacation photographs of his home-town before the disaster. Still aesthetically lyrical, these private photos are made all the more poignant by their digital presentation. Unlike the bodily presence of the photos of destruction, these memories of home are ungraspable.
If we (humanity) destroy the natural environment, it only hastens nature's disregard for humanity. Perhaps, Hatakeyama dares to wonder, this is the "natural" order itself: "nature" as only the designation of the unknowable excess of being.
Hatakeyama impressed me more than any photographer I've been newly introduced to in a long time. His work is all about the "concept of nature," which should not be confused with "nature" itself. Like many others, he is obsessed with the relationship between human-built structures and their natural surroundings. But unlike the majority of artists who tackle such themes Hatakeyama utterly rejects the notion of "nature vs. civilization." He instead understands civilization, that is to say humanity, as just another manifestation of "nature." "Nature," as a binary-partner to "civilization," is thus made meaningless in Hatakeyama's lens.
Great hills are made from mining dust. Sewers are made to constitute the most impressive "natural" caves. The peaks and valleys of great metropolises are visually equated with the topographies of subterranean catacombs.
All this leads to a meditation on Hatakeyama's home-town, which was devastated by the 2011 tsunami. Sixty art-photographs of utter ruin, of post-apocalyptic abandonment, are juxtaposed with a digital slide show of sixty of Hatakeyama's vacation photographs of his home-town before the disaster. Still aesthetically lyrical, these private photos are made all the more poignant by their digital presentation. Unlike the bodily presence of the photos of destruction, these memories of home are ungraspable.
If we (humanity) destroy the natural environment, it only hastens nature's disregard for humanity. Perhaps, Hatakeyama dares to wonder, this is the "natural" order itself: "nature" as only the designation of the unknowable excess of being.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews