Floating in Lethe

About the productJapanese

Kumagai is an artist who has explored a form of photographic expression in commercial photography, particularly portraits, that grasps the inner core of a person with one hand.

From major projects such as "Monthly Nikaido Fumi" and "Sugisaki Hana First Photo Collection Utopia," to collaborations with independent artists such as Dairakudakan, Natsume Tomoyuki (ex. Siamese Cats), and Lee Ran that go beyond the photographer/subject division, to relationships with friends and acquaintances, he has captured on camera the "relationships" he has had with a wide range of people.

In recent years, Kumagai's main subjects have been the people of Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, whom he met after the Great East Japan Earthquake, and his mother, who suffers from dementia and lives in a nursing home. These are people who have lost much but live strong lives in the present, and his mother, who lives each day with a "new life" while losing memories, proof of her existence. The artist found a river flowing into his own "now" in these images, and released his first collection of works, "Red River" (2017, published by our company).

Seven years have passed since then. During the period between the COVID-19 pandemic, his mother passed away, his childhood home was vacant, and he was forced to say goodbye to friends. As the very relationships he had built up until then were lost and transformed, the artist himself, who said he "thought he was taking photographs because he didn't want to forget," is also changing little by little.

In other words, instead of viewing sadness, loss, life and death as fixed states, he sees them as a waypoint to a "new life" - a future where we don't know what lies ahead or what will become of us. If there is something that remains at the bottom of what we lose and forget, it may be hope for something that can be seen beyond "transformation." This new state of mind that the author has reached is presented in this work, "Floating in Lethe." (From the publisher)

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Product Information

Publisher TISSUE PAPERS

release date 2024 / 07 / 16

Part numberKPHT10118W-9784909287090

Specification 232mm x 165mm / Silver paper cover / Japanese and English text included

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