Gaifos at Zen Foto
5th September 2010
It is a testament to the high craftsmanship and artistic sense of the gaifos in Tokyo that we had another great evening with work that ranged from fine technical expertise to striking examples of photo reportage.
This is just to give you all a flavour of the work we saw from some participants during the evening:
Andy Palaski
Andy brought prints of his photography of currency around the world. Andy uses large format photography, that he scans and prints digitally. The exhibition prints are over 1 metre wide. A new view on money.
Peter Cook
Peter showed more of his superb work, this time a commission made at Ryoan-In temple, taken at 7am in the heat of the Kyoto summer. The second print was of Ryoan-ji. Taken at 7:30am with half an hour to set up, shoot and get out. Peter managed about 7 shots on 5x4, cropped to 6x12. Taken in large format, scanned to extremely fine detail. Printed on Epson inkjet.
1.2m x 1.5m will be the exhibition print size. Peter is trying his first art fair – taking some prints to Sydney art fair.
Paolo Patrizi
Paolo showed us a short series taken during this summer, following Japanese politicians on the campaign trail. Some of the politicians began to recognize the gaijin photographer when they turned up at their next destination. Paolo pointed out that their schedules are announced well in advance, something that we would not expect from Western politicians.An interesting series, with potential to take it further?
Daisuke Ito
Following his recent show at Zen Foto Daisuke showed us some dyptichs of Cuban boxers together with Mexican prostitutes. Both live through their bodies. Daisuke also showed us some vivid pictures from the favelas of Rio.
Ronnie Wright
First timer at Gaifos, Ronnie showed one of his series from his website: “Former Colored Only Schools in North Carolina”. Ronnie clearly feels close to these places, having visited many with his father. The schools have often been converted into alternative uses, some abandoned and some demolished.
Yusuke Takagi
Yusuke showed us two series: 1. Trafficking of brides from Burma to China. 2. Portraits of Burmese dissidents. Both are very moving and impressive. Some ideas were exchanged about ways to get them published either in Japan or overseas. More suggestions welcome.
Androniki Christodoulou
Niki showed work taken for a travel magazine from the Thai, Laos, Cambodia borders. Apologies if I got the geography wrong, I have never been there, but Gwen recognized several places from (ahem) a few years back that have almost changed beyond recognition, under modern “progress”. Some great images of refugees and beautiful pictures of hill tribes in traditional dress.
thank you to all who came and contributed, we will hold the next meeting in a month or so, maybe late October.
Mark Pearson Gwen Robinson
Zen Foto