Ikko Narahara

HEAVEN

May 8 - May 30, 2003
Photo Gallery International

Ikko Narahara

HEAVEN

May 8 - May 30, 2003
Photo Gallery International

  • ©Ikko Narahara Archives

Ikko Narahara‘s images from his latest photo book “HEAVEN ” are on display this month.

The work consists of three parts, and the third part of this show under the title of “Double Vision” also decorated the final section of his first retrospective exhibition held at Maison Europeenne de la Photographie in Paris from December 12, 2002 through March 9, 2003.

 

He conceived the idea of HEAVEN when he visited Parc de Sceaux. The park is the place where Eugene Atget took a series of photographs a year before he died. Ikko cherished his work and made a trip to the park when he reached the same age of Atget working on the series.

 

Some time after this trip, he was sent to hospital and, while he was under medical treatment, he had a unique experience of double visions. Based on this intricate visual sensation, he crystallized his idea of creating his heaven by overlapping visions separately conceived by both eyes.

 

The first part “Seven Heavens – Roma”(1998) is the world of the ocellus looking into the heaven through a narrow view. The field of vision then evolves to multiple in the second part “Vertical Horizon – Tokyo”(1991-1995) and finally at the third section “Double Vision – Paris” (2000-2002) the world converges into the human body through the compound eye of a human being.

 

In this exhibition, images from the photo book have been rearranged in size and display to maximize the effect of the gallery space. Digitalized images from negatives have been printed out with inkjet on paper appropriate for each image after color and composite of images being adjusted. They are Ikko’s first digital images and, computer has been used freely for image enhancement conventional process cannot achieve. Forty-five images in color and b/w are exhibited.

Ikko Narahara (1931–2020)

Born in Fukuoka, Japan in 1931. He began his career in photography with the highly controversial debut exhibition Man and His Land in 1956 and received a master’s degree in Art from Waseda University in 1959. Narahara also co-founded the VIVO cooperative alongside Shomei Tomatsu, Eikoh Hosoe, Kikuji Kawada and others in 1959 (the group dissolved in 1961). Basing himself in Paris (1962-1964) and later New York (1970-1974) he went on to photograph various locations throughout the globe. After returning to Japan in 1974 he continued pursuing international projects as well as putting on multiple exhibitions. Narahara has published numerous monographs and received critical acclaim both at home and abroad.

 

 

Exhibitions at PGI

Japanesque Zen, 2015
HEAVEN, 2003
Where Time Has Vanished 1970−1974, 1998
Rebirth・1990, 1991
Broadway, 1991
Eight Japanese Photographers, 1988
Human Land, 1987