Matias Aguilar 1_2008, 3_2008_1

Copyright Matias Aguilar
...more winter 2008 images here

Thomas Steinert

Copyright Thomas Steinert

Courtesy of Der Spiegel this web gallery features the work of East German photographer Thomas Steinert... here ...It gives us a glimpse of daily life in the GDR before the fall of the Mauer.

Dietmar Gottschall

Copyright Dietmar Gottschall

Juri Gottschall, the son of late German Photographer Dietmar Gottschall put up a site featuring his father's work that until now has been unknown to the public. On view are excellent pictures taken from the sixties to the eighties; street photographs, portraits and selections from journalistic assignments of Dieter Gottschall, who died in 1997.

here

Masahisa Fukase

Copyright Masahisa Fukase

more of MASAHISA FUKASE Bukbuku pictures here

Masahisa Fukase was born in Hokkaido, Japan in 1934. In 1952 he enrolled in the Photography Department of Nihon University in Tokyo. After graduation in 1956 he was hired at Dai-Ichi Advertising Company, where he began working as a commercial photographer while he pursued his artistic career. Two solo exhibitions followed in quick succession. 1974 marked several important events in Fukase's life. He established a photography school called The Workshop with his colleagues Shomei Tomatsu, Eiko Hosoe, Noriaki Yokosuka, Daido Moriyama and Nobuyoshi Araki. The same year, his work was included in the exhibition New Japanese Photography at the Museum of Modern Art, curated by John Szarkowski and Shoji Yamagishi. Despite these professional accomplishments, his unstable marriage of the past ten years had begun to dissolve; he returned to his birthplace of Hokkaido seeking solace. At this time, Fukase began to photograph the black birds that would become emblematic of his finest work. Sadly, on June 20, 1992 a severe accident prematurely ended Fukase's artistic career. Although he was among a generation of young Japanese artists struggling with the constraints of their society, Fukase strayed from the cultural concerns and nihilistic expressionism of his colleagues, focusing instead on a deeply personal meditation on human existence. The somber beauty of his raven photographs reflect his lonely, troubled life and reveal his appreciation of the defiant isolation of these creatures.

(Courtesy of Robert Mann Galllery)

more MASAHISA FUKASE here

Miwa Yanagi

Copyright Miwa Yanagi

White Casket. Photographs by Miwa Yanagi. Nazraeli Press, Tucson, 2003. 72 pp., 48 color illustrations, 13x12".

In our present age of supreme mobility, differences of culture with other industrialized nations are rarely shocking; things seem to stay in the realm of being an oddity at most. The tradition of employing 'elevator girls' in upscale Japanese department stores is definitely in this category. Assigned the role of hostess, the coveted position of 'elevator girl' brings an aura of elegance to the shopping experience. Miwa Yanagi flips this world on its head in The White Casket, a body of work that casts groups of elevator girls into elaborate fictional scenes. Both the photographs and the book are immaculate—large format, crisp design with seamless digital renderings.

(Courtesy of Photo-Eye)

here for the Book Tease

Publisher's Description:

White Casket. In The White Casket, Japanese artist Miwa Yanagi has created a bizarre fantasy world inhabited by department store “elevator girls.” In upscale Japanese department stores, the elevator girl performs the role of a hostess, directing customers to their destinations while lending an aura of elegance to the shopping experience. The position of elevator girl is a highly-prized one; those holding this position are selected by management, and are expected to exude youth, innocence and beauty. In The White Casket – the collective title for the work as presented here – Yanagi takes advantage of digital technology to create virtual spaces composed of elements from several different locations, creating elaborate settings in which the elevator girls live as “prisoners in paradise.” Miwa Yanagi is a pioneer in contemporary photo-based art. Her work is included in important public and private collections throughout Japan, the US, and Europe. The White Casket documents this well-known body of work in a large-format, beautifully-reproduced monograph.

Miwa Yanagi Interview @ JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART- online here