Masahisa Fukase. The Solitude of Ravens.

Masahisa Fukase died in June 9 (a month ago)  at the age of 78. He was detained in a hospital in a coma since June 20, 1992, when he suffered a severe concussion after falling down stairs in a bar. He was drunk trying to escape from his perpetuating avian hell.

In 1974, his work was included in the exhibition New Japanese Photography at the Museum of Modern Art, curated by John Szarkowski and Shoji Yamagishi.

In 1976, when Yoko, his wife and muse for 13 years, decided to divorce, were tied by a bond so tight that covered "from the deepest pleasure to desire suicide and destruction".

The departure of Fukase's wife, Yoko, left no room for fond rememberance. It was on pilgrimage to the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido that he adopted the raven as the symbol of the pain which never left him.

"In The Solitude of Ravens Masahisa Fukase's work can be deemed to have reached its supreme height; it can also be said to have fallen to its greatest depth". So begins Akira Hasegawa's afterword to Fukase's The Solitude of Ravens, which was originally titled Karasu (Ravens) when it was published in Japan. There can be few photobooks sadder, lonelier, or more tragic than this sequence. Fukase had been famous for the joyous photographs he took of his wife but the marriage dissolved in 1976 and the emotions depicted in Fukase's portfolio began to reverse direction.

In The Solitude of Ravens, Masahisa Fukase leaves behind an expressionistic epitaph, a potent and agonizing physical and emotional pilgrimage through personal depression. Each exquisitely sequenced plate permeates with impending doom, and this tragically haunting narrative is overwhelming in its somber and deeply affecting power. The book he left behind is a record of a man who turned inward, leaving behind pure images of personal grief.

The raven is a creature heavy with imbued meaning. Edgar Allan Poe's Raven, whose "eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming", was a conflict of darkness and light. There is a dangerous loneliness to the singular bird and a great gloom to the flock that weighs down a sky. Perched together on a spindly tree, they sit in apparent melancholy. The raven lends itself to a particularly Japanese aesthetic. Elegant and strong in silhouette, it could be said to resemble a calligraphic marking. One image in the book is of a large aeroplane blocking out most of the viewfinder, its outline resembling the raven.

The first edition of the book was published as Karasu in 1986, though it was also labelled The Ravens. The cover shows a black on black silhouette of a raven, similar to the photograph at the top of this article. The book, like many Japanese Photobooks, is housed in a simply brown cardboard slipcase, and is now incredibly rare (used can be found over 2000 euros)  In 2010 a panel of five selected by the British Journal of Photography announced Karasu as the best published photography book published between 1986 and 2009.

“Even though Fukase made his pictures in bad light and bad weather, never bothering with technical niceties, the results are both luminous and beautiful,” say Martin Parr and Gerry Badger. “He enlarges tiny portions of his negatives, pushing for the limits of legibility. One climatic image of silhouetted birds in formation, wings outstretched against a grainy sky, metamorphoses into a wire news service image of overheard warplanes, a significant, and traumatic image for postwar Japan.”

As I read in another article this man died 3 times. First when he divorced with Yoko, his wife. The second time when he fell in coma 20 years ago and the final and liberating exit a month ago with his physical death.
R.I.P Masahisa Fukase, your Ravens will always be alive in our dreams, in our nightmares.

All photos ©Masahisa Fukase

Trent Parke. Minutes to Midnight or Moments of a Genius?

Trent Parke was born in 1971 and raised in Newcastle, New South Wales. Using his mother's Pentax Spotmatic and the family laundry as a darkroom, he began taking pictures when he was around 12 years old. Today, Parke, the only Australian photographer to be represented by Magnum, works primarily as a street photographer.

Trent Parke, the first Australian to become a Full Member of the renowned photographers' cooperative Magnum Photo Agency, is considered one of the most innovative and challenging young photographers of his generation. He is also member of street photography collective of In-Public. 

In 2003, with wife and fellow photographer Narelle Autio, Parke drove almost 90,000 km (56,000 miles) around Australia. He had been saving for five years to make a road trip, but finally set off after noticing a newspaper survey that claimed most Australians thought their country had come to the end of an era. Parke says it was then he decided that the time had come to find out what his country had become. Minutes to Midnight, the collection of photographs from this journey, offers a sometimes disturbing portrait of twenty-first century Australia, from the desiccated outback to the chaotic, melancholic vitality of life in remote Aboriginal towns. For this project Parke was awarded the W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography.

The project of  Minutes to Midnight is a highly personal and elemental kind: events, people and places as they are chanced upon and as they appear, not in the face of a looming deadline, but in the perma-glare of the outback.. Like many of Parke’s photographs it is beyond news. It looks as if it could have been taken the day after tomorrow, in the aftermath of history.

Trent Parke's intense black and white photographs present a vision of this country that is desolate, dark, and hauntingly beautiful. He went looking for Australia and found not a dead heart, but a heart of darkness. He found a harsh country still dealing with its brutal colonial past, unsure of its future and where it is going. But Parke finishes the exhibition on a cautiously hopeful note. The final image records the birth of his son. Presented on a glowing light box, the next generation arrives slippery wet, limply white and with his eyes wide open.

Parke won World Press Photo Awards in 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2005, and in 2006 was granted the ABN AMRO Emerging Artist Award. He was selected to be part of the World Press Photo Masterclass in 1999. Parke has published two books, Dream/Life in 1999, and The Seventh Wave with Narelle Autio in 2000. His work has been exhibited widely. In 2006 the National Gallery of Australia acquired Parke's entire Minutes to Midnight exhibition.

                                                          All photos ©Trent Parke

Trent Parke's quote: "I am forever chasing light. Light turns the ordinary into the magical."  

That's Life. Street photography in India.

That's Life is a collective of street photographers who capture life on the streets of India in fresh and unusual ways that tell interesting and sometimes humorous stories. That's Life was set up not only to showcase the work of these photographers but to promote this real and honest genre of photography.

Street photography is an emerging art form in India. While extremely personal and subjective, it is probably the hardest to do. It is an unadulterated documentation of life … history if you will.

If nothing else, the images in "That's Life"  will prove that there is so much happening around us at all times, so many fleeting but special moments which often pass by unnoticed. Hopefully "That's Life" will open your eyes and your mind to the amazing possibilities unfolding on the streets of India every day.

©Arindam Thokder

Hi Kaushal, tell us few words  about your new street photography collective, "That's life". How this idea came alive?

Hi Andreas. I have been shooting on the streets of India for a few years, but it took a long time for my work to get noticed. Gaining confidence from some prominent international street photographers like David Gibson and Richard Bram, and with a nudge from my friend and fellow street photographer Eric Kim, I decided to try and form a collective. There are a lot of talented street photographers in India who continue to shoot in a bubble and often go unnoticed. As a collective we can wield more power and gain more exposure.

  ©Kaushal Parikh

What is your purpose as collective, I mean what do you think you could achieve better  as collective than as individual photographers.

India is a diverse country and the streets are very unique and different from the West.  In fact the streets within India are very different when you go from the larger cities to the small towns.  As a collective we hope to showcase work from across India in different personal styles and expressions that will add interest to the fascinating scenes that unfold in the streets on a daily basis.  With a group of like-minded people, all passionate about street photography, I am sure we will be able to promote the amazing work created in the streets of this diverse country.

©Prantik Mazumder

You started this group only four and now you are seven. What is your plan for the future?

We currently have 7 very talented photographers, all with a very personal style and mostly from different professional backgrounds.  I think there are only two full time photographers. 
To start with we hope to reach at least 10 members in the next few months.  The search for talent is on but we want to keep membership very selective to maintain a certain standard of what we think is good street photography. 
The future has many possibilities and some of the ideas that I don’t mind talking about presently include participating in international photography festivals like the LSFP, having That’s Life exhibitions, and conducting workshops etc. to increase the awareness of street photography.

©Suyog Gaidhani

Is there any prerequisite  in a style of  a photographer to be member in your group or is it enough to be a good street photographer shooting in India. I mean do you after a specific style,  aesthetics  or in the opposite you ask for  different styles in your group?

I think the most important thing is to be a good street photographer.  As far as style goes there is no fixed aesthetic we are looking for.  In fact the more diverse our members, both geographically and aesthetically, the better.  And what is cool is that if we have two or three members from the same city but with different styles it will give viewers different viewpoints of the same city that can be very interesting.

 ©Prashant Godbole

When most of the people think of India they think of a place with strong juxtapositions and very crowded. Do you want as group to make this image stronger or show something else?

When shooting in India it is very hard to avoid juxtapositions and crowds, but at the same time if someone can show a different side to the streets of this country we will welcome that point of view.  In fact the existing portfolios already showcase a mix of busy images, quiet images, images that emphasize light and shadow, juxtapositions, humour, b&w and colour.  We don’t want to force any particular style.  The only thing we are adamant about is good and meaningful imagery.

 ©Mark Carey

Why a street photographer must come and shoot in India's streets? What makes India different than the rest of the world in your opinion.

If by the rest of the world you mean cities like NY, Paris, London which are the home for street photography, then India is a world apart in so many ways.  The streets are crowded and not very clean.  There is excessive poverty on the streets.  These things make it very challenging to create an aesthetically pleasing image but also offer the possibility of creating work that is fresh.  Having said that photographing on the streets of India is far less stressful because the people are a lot warmer and more open to being photographed.  In all my years shooting on the streets I can barely remember a few instances where I was asked not to make an image.  Of course the key is to maintain a respect for your subjects and not exploit underprivileged people in unbecoming circumstances.  A sincere outlook and a smile on the streets of India go a long way.

 ©Amit Chakravarty

I have seen many pictures from India from dozens photographers. How easy or difficult is to be unique as a photographer in such a scenery as India is.

To be unique in India is probably as difficult as being unique in Cuba, Turkey, the UK or any other extensively photographed country in the world.  That is where you can separate the good photographers from the street snappers.  The good ones can isolate a scene in a crowd and capture it in a way that is reflective of their personal expression.  People see things differently so the challenge lies in translating your view of the world onto film.  If done accurately then it will most likely be unique.

©Arindam Thokder

Is there anything else you'd like to add about your group ?

I would just like to thank you, Andreas, for giving us this platform to talk about our collective.  That’s Life will hopefully become the default site that anyone will visit when they want to view street photography created on the streets of India.
Visit us at www.thatslife.in.
Cheers!

Thank you very much, I wish you all the best and I'm looking forward seeing even more interesting things from India and your collective.