LOCATION: Villa Bottini main floor

HOURS: Mon - Fri 15.00 to 19.30 / Sat - Sun and 7 and 8 December from 10.00 to 19.30

NOTES: World premiere exhibition edited  by Giuliana Scimé

LUCCAdigitalPHOTO Award 09

Eikoh Hosoe

Ecstasy and memory: new 'scrolls', anthology 1960-2005

The LUCCAdigitalPHOTOfest is proud to confer the Award 2009 for lifetime achievement to Eikoh Hosoe, One of the most representative figures in contemporary photography, inimitable teacher since the beginning of his 'adventure' in photography, his research has evolved in startling conceptual and formal solutions.

For LUCCAdigitalPHOTOfest Eikoh Hosoe has explicitly made the 'scroll' (picture scrolls) that adhere to the representative form of Japanese painting.

In correspondance with the avant-garde contemporary technique, Hosoe has printed pictures of some of his world-famous series (Man and Woman, Ordeal by Roses, Kamaitachi, Kimono, The Cosmos of Gaudi, Ukiyo-e Projections, The Butterfly Dream) by a process of completely innovative and unique digital prints on washi paper, (wa meaning Japanese and shi paper), a term used to define traditional  hand made paper .

The idea of this revolutionary representative form came to Eikoh Hosoe from the 'scroll' illustrating the Tale of Genji, the first novel ever written in human history that dates back to 1001-05; the 'scrolls' were created almost two centuries later.

The series are arranged along the walls of the exhibition space as if they where long posters seamlessly combining ancient culture of Japan, art and revolutionary technology, thanks to the incomparable genius of this artist  in the international creative photography.

'The camera is generally considered unable to recover what is invisible to the eye. And the photographer who dominates  the camera can resume what is hidden in his memory. "Eikoh Hosoe

Eikoh Hosoe was born on 18 March 1933 inYonezawa, Prefecture of Yamagata. His father was a Shinto priest. A few months after his birth, the family moved to Tokyo. In 1944, when the city was hit by sustained and violent bombing of the allied forces,they returned to the home village, until September 1945, after the surrender of Japan.

The time spent in the village had a deep  impact on the imaginary  of little Hosoe learning the ancient legends, and it is from their influence that will emerge the work Kamaitachi (The crescent of the weasel, 1965), The protagonist of the visual story isTatsumi Hijikata, the creator, along with Kazuo OhnoOf Butoh dance. That world of fantasy and mystery stories of his childhood will weigh upon  his imaginary  creating a truly original and expressive language.