As part of a project with art historian Cécile Laly, Mami Kiyoshi produced the photographs of the exhibition Wadako, stories of Japanese kites. To meet the latest manufacturers of traditional kites and to set their personal and intimate stories about their craft and art with words and images, which was the intent of the project, scientific for one, artistic for the other.
At a time when globalization universalizes leisure and urban expansion nibbles open spaces, flying octopus – another name for kites in the land of the rising sun – are less numerous in the sky, as are artisans which gives them body, perpetuating gestures and graphic universes inherited from a father or a master.
With all the attention given to the world since her first New Reading portraits, Mami Kiyoshi could only be touched by the destiny of these artisans, to whom she pays homage in these photographic portraits. If his artistic vocabulary is immediately recognizable – square form, precise framing, rigorous composition, light that reveals each element, meticulous arrangement of abundant objects that surround the saturated models and colors at the edge of the artificiality – the artist plays here more with the angle of view, the staging of the planes and the depth of field. Thus the first plans are invaded by kites, lanterns, the materials that their manufacture requires and the works filled with patterns and ancestral models that inspire them while the characters take place further back of the image, sometimes merging into the studio. Thanks to the sharpness she gives to every detail of the performance, Mami Kiyoshi manages to value both the men and objects of art they produce, thus paying equal attention to their respective destinies and history. each of which is a carrier.
With all the attention given to the world since her first New Reading portraits, Mami Kiyoshi could only be touched by the destiny of these artisans, to whom she pays homage in these photographic portraits. If his artistic vocabulary is immediately recognizable – square form, precise framing, rigorous composition, light that reveals each element, meticulous arrangement of abundant objects that surround the saturated models and colors at the edge of the artificiality – the artist plays here more with the angle of view, the staging of the planes and the depth of field. Thus the first plans are invaded by kites, lanterns, the materials that their manufacture requires and the works filled with patterns and ancestral models that inspire them while the characters take place further back of the image, sometimes merging into the studio. Thanks to the sharpness she gives to every detail of the performance, Mami Kiyoshi manages to value both the men and objects of art they produce, thus paying equal attention to their respective destinies and to the story which each one carry.
It is also through the play of eyes, carefully staged, that the artist prints his images a narrative dimension in a clever mix of gravity and nostalgia. Whether the craftsman stares at the lens, smiles, looks out of the picture-in a past he’s trying to remember, or toward a brighter future, who knows? -Or he’s absorbed With his hands and eyes, he asserts his presence in a changing world, crystallizing the link to history and heritage and giving the photographer and viewer the status of a witness.
So surely the stories of Mami Kiyoshi’s Japanese kites are more than just photographic portraits. These are true condensations of life and passion, visual narratives of these women and men sensitive to the beauty of these poetic and graceful objects that dance between earth and sky, between past and future.
Mami Kiyoshi – Wadako, histoires de cerfs-volants japonais
From October 6th to December 1st, 2018
Galerie Annie Gabrielli
33 avenue F. Delmas
34000 Montpellier
