“Ashimoto” is a polysemic term, which in Japanese means “around the feet”, among other senses. Referring only to the foot, but also the foot including the leg, or just a part of the foot which is intuited through the folds of a kimono. This title, as if it were another work of the project, allows multiple interpretations: as many as viewers of the works; as many as the megalopolis itself.
Tokyo and beauty as inspiration. Metonymy as a visual language. Intimacy as a leitmotiv. In this series of photographs of female feet and legs, César Ordóñez has deliberately chosen a different way to portray. Showing the part for the whole. The viewers will have to complete with their imagination these portraits; which paradoxically convey a deep intimacy, although they were taken in public places.
And it is precisely the concept of “intimacy” in a huge urban environment such as Tokyo which has articulated all his projects in the Japanese megalopolis. A vast scenario full of infinite layers that overlap and interact with each other. In a symbolic way, the deliberate mixture of photos –color, black and white, static and moving– intended to be a metaphor of those uncountable layers.
In this series, there were some “stolen photos” and also pictures that were permitted. But in both cases he prefers to define them as “found photographs.” All women who participated in this project, always by casual encounter on the street, did so selflessly. And although some of the “portrayed” girls were aware that they were being photographed, no scene was prepared beforehand.
