Views of Yoshiko Seino

From October, Koganei Artfull Action! will hold a series of talks, “Public lecture: opening dialog.” For each talk a guest will be invited to give a presentation on several subjects, with time for dialog with participants.

Our guest for the second talk, entitled “Views of Yoshiko Seino,” will be Taro Amano.
Photographer Yoshiko Seino*, born in 1962, belonged to the generation that went through the era of the “bubble” economy and its subsequent collapse soon after entering working life. How did Seino’s sharp and exceptional sensitivity lead her to capture the significance of this era with her body and eyes?
In this talk we look through Seino’s views at what we have built up from the destruction of the values we held until then, and from the wilderness-like ground zero that followed the collapse of the bubble economy, which was a major watershed of its time. If we pause with introspection and look this broad, indistinct era in the face through Seino’s work, we may be able to hang some hope on the future.
Joining us in our reflection will be guest Taro Amano, an expert on Seino’s work and the organizer of “Anti-Memory: Contemporary Photography II” at Yokohama Museum of Art.

*Yoshiko Seino (1962 – 2009)
Born in 1962 in Tokyo, Seino entered the Chuokoronsha publishing company in 1987, where she worked as an editor at Marie Claire magazine. She began taking pictures in the 1990s, and after leaving Chuokoronsha in 1995 concentrated on her photography career.

About “Public lecture: opening dialog”
When we engage with political news through the media, despite the fact that politics is fundamental to supporting our everyday lives, we quickly get used to the careless way things are decided though we may wonder at it. Nor do we question the quantity or quality of the huge amount of information flying about online: it feels like we come to a convenient understanding of something from our partial understanding of each of the diverse fragments we are fed. We seem to be living in a very complex, fast-changing and emotionally-charged society.
The interrelationships and consequences of each event are skated over due to their complex connections and the speed of change; and the event itself gets forgotten in a short time. In spite of the daily occurrence of serious issues, disconcerting events, incidents and accidents, each are dealt with in a dismissive way as if they are fiction. A society that doesn’t present a clear and connected picture of itself could be called a “zone of emptiness.” Society as a whole dilutes reality, and the reality of the existence of each of us living in it is also diluted in the same way. It’s as if we’re drifting on an emptiness resembling the world of an amusement arcade or video game.

The great artists of our time whether consciously or unconsciously are compelled to seize the characteristics of our society and depict them in a variety of ways. Art is a very emotional act, but exceptional creative expression doesn’t allow the artist’s earnest quest to get swept away. We regard this group of work as shining a light on the present; and we want to get together with lots of people to start experiments with dialogue that attains the raw reality of life, unbound by analysis or existing values.

Developing this sort of forum for dialog together with the public will lead to the extension of creative possibility, something that tends to atrophy and shrink in Japanese society. If the existence of this dialog leads to a more diverse and abundant expansion of creativity, and in particular not to artistic expression aimed at self-verification or the desire for approval or recognition, we might also simultaneously extend various possibilities for surviving in the society of the future.

Planning: Miho Miyashita (NPO Artfull Action)