2020 EXHIBITION

 
 

One year after my 2019 gallery exhibition in Tokyo, the covid pandemic had reached serious proportions in Japan. Unable to organize another in-person event, I created this virtual exhibition of my work in 2020.

Curves printed on Bizan washi paper - click for a larger view

One of the things I have been working on the past few months is finding more expressive media for my prints. I am pleased to announce a new print series using Bizan washi papers. Each print on these individually hand made sheets is literally one-of -a-kind. For more on washi, please visit Awagami’s site: https://awagami.com/pages/washi-paper-basics. I would be pleased to send anyone who wishes to order from this exhibition or earlier work a finished print to inspect and decide whether to keep the print or return it for a full refund. Please click on the ‘Prints’ tab above for further details.

 

THE EXHIBITION IMAGES


Please move your cursor or tap with a finger over the images to see captions or click for an expanded view of the images

 

Snow Fence Hokkaido 2020

Wandering around in a blizzard on the outskirts of Hokkaido’s Lake Oonuma I noticed these gentle white slopes receding gently toward the contrasting stand of dark trees beyond. The wind-driven snow can’t be seen against the ground or sky but I accentuated the local contrast around the trees to highlight the streaking snow and give the trees a pointellist definition against the grey clouds.

Yoichi Dusk Hokkaido 2020

These rocks, sometimes called ‘the married couple’ in Japanese for their complementary curves, are an iconic subject in a small inlet near the western Hokkaido seaport (and birthplace of Japanese whisky) Yoichi. I clambered up breakwater rocks on the shore to gain a level view that showed the rocks in their wider setting (including the little lighthouse on the left). The sun had actually set a half hour earlier, but this two minute exposure captured the march of clouds above the bay.

Snow Fence Hokkaido 2020

I caught site of this lone snow fence as I crested a hillside path between Hokkaido farm fields blanketed in snow. As I continued walking down I looked back and saw how the fence and its shadow formed a delicate arch over the ridge, so I plowed into the snow bank and across the field until I was at the right angle to frame this image.

Fortress Hokodate, 2020

Another image composed in the middle of the snowstorm as I visiting the old Goryokaku fort at Hakodate, Hokkaido. I had climbed up onto the earthen embankments above the moat and saw how the black trees and snow-encrusted stone walls of the fort faded away in the storm, seemingly back in time, even though this location is today in the center of a modern city.

Blizzard Onuma 2020

After a morning trying to find compositions under heavy snowfall along a lake in southern Hokkaido, my friends and I were heading back to our car when I spotted this ornamental bridge to a small island cluster off-shore. It was had to see, much less compose, but I liked how the falling snow imparted an abstracting blur to the otherwise busy scene while the already thick snow cover helped emphasize the darker forms of the bridge and larger trees. As with the ‘Curves Hokkaido 2020’ image above, I processed the image for high micro contrast to emphasize the pointillist effect of the driving snow.

Kussharo Boats Hokkaido 2019

Clouds had rolled over Lake Kussharo in eastern Hokkaido on this early morning, creating a whiteout which allowed me to create this minimalist composition with boats beached above the snow below hovering bare trees, both waiting for warmer weather.

Winter Dance Shiga Kogen 2020

Although the snowy Shiga Kogen region of Nagano is dotted with ski slopes, the portion protected from development in the Joshinetsukogen National Park is one of my favorite places to visit for landscapes within a day’s drive of Karuizawa. Japanese birches dominate the slopes on either side of the main access road to the area (Rte 292). I hiked along one stretch I found this pair of trees dancing in isolation in a meadow only a few meters from the road and chose a high key exposure and processing to further isolate the forms from their environment.

Left Behind Hokkaido 2020

Hokkaido is famous for the vibrant color patterns formed by its summertime flower farms, but driving though the souther Hokkaido countryside this past winter my friends and I came across what appeared to be the remains of a sunflower field abandoned to the heavy snow. Across the field were clusters of dried and frozen stalks and I composed this grouping which seemed to tell a story.

Clearing Storm, Mt. Myoko Gunma 2020

Mt.Myogi guards the approach to the Nagano highlands from the Kanto plain and, unlike most of the more volcanic mountains behind it, Myogi’s craggy slopes resemble classical landscape paintings from China’s Yellow Mountains, especially when fog is swirling around its rocky spires. The conditions looked right to capture such images when I started hiking up Moyogi’s steep slopes on this July morning, (starting with the several hundred paved steps rising from the shrine at the mountain’s base), but by the time I made it up to where the views were open, the front had begun to move off the mountain and instead I found this long-distance view of the trees hanging precariously onto the mountain rocks below the receding cloud layers.

Mist, Sajikiyama Gunma 2020

I often visit this charming alpine meadow near Oyunomaru Kogen in search of a good composition among the widely spaced birch trees. On this particular summer afternoon, fog had just begun to flow down to the meadow from the slopes of Mt. Sajikiyama above and helped separate the background from these particular trees and the luxuriant ferns and wildflowers carpeting the meadow floor beneath them. But there was still a bit of weak sunlight filtering through the clouds above and lighting up patches of foreground. I processed this image to emphasize the beams and the growing softness in the air as the mist rolled in.

Cataracts Asama Great Falls 2020

Although named for the dominant mountain to its west, the Asama Great Falls (浅間大瀧) is actually fed by waters from the powerful Kuma River falling down the steep slopes of Asamakakushiyama to its east. The heavy rains over the past year have temporarily knocked out the main trail accessing the falls, but this summer I scrambled down the steep slope from the paved road way above in hopes that the continuous rainfall this past rainy season were making the falls even more dynamic. As I made my way over the slippery rocks up to the falls I saw I wasn’t the only one with this idea as a lone pilgrim was standing under the falls chanting in a traditional purification ritual, so I backed down the trail and waited until he departed. I made a number of compositions looking to convey the power of the massive falls against the hard volcanic rock, but ended up thinking this tight framing captured a bit of the mood left behind by the pilgrim.

Volcanic Slopes Mt. Asama 2020

I composed this image near the saddle between Mt. Asama and its nearby volcanic offspring, Koasamayama. Although the sun was sinking behind the bigger mountain, the sky above was clear and still illuminating the greens of the low bushes and isolated small trees clinging to the volcanic scree. On this hike I had brought a camera modified to see only in infrared to better capture the contrasts in this environment. I took advantage of the fog rising up the slopes below to isolate this small tree that seemed rather exuberant despite its harsh surroundings.

 

Notsuke Dawn Hokkaido 2019

The Notsuke Peninsula is a narrow spit of lowland jutting out from Hokkaido’s eastern edge barely above sea level. The tortured shapes of dead trees, killed off perhaps by salt rising through the thin soil, dominate the otherwise open snow fields at the northern end of the strand. My friends and I arrived here by dawn to capture the rose glow of dawn through the clouds on the pale trees and even paler snow.

Sunset Ice Hokkaido 2019

This first of two studies of the winter light off the Notsuke Peninsula. In this first one, the white ice flow floating a little off shore (perhaps a remnant of the sea ice which often floats down from Siberian waters at this time of year) took on a purple cast even as the almost mirror-calm waters around it glowed pink in the last rays of the setting sun.

Blue Hour Ice Hokkaido 2019

This second study of winter light at the Notsuke Peninsula was made almost an hour later than the first, during the ‘blue hour’ which follows dusk. It wouldn’t often be possible to make such a photograph over sea water in such low light, but the waters of the Izmeny Strait were so calm that evening that I could hold this floating ice form in reasonably good focus for a thirty seconds exposure even as the last light faded to black.

Winter Winds Hokkaido 2019

The sun was setting behind the Soya Strait as I composed this image at the northern-most tip of Hokkaido. On this bitterly cold evening the seawater near the shore had the consistency of sherbet but the strong north wind was still strong enough to whip up waves and drive the ocean swells slowly onto the encrusted breakwaters on the beech. A few low hanging clouds were also being blown at high speed over the shore and I waited for one to line up in a pleasing way with the cliff and array of wind turbine toward which it was headed.

Sawaki Light Hokkaido 2019

The heavy clouds on this winter morning bathed this small northern Hokkaido fishing harbor in an almost unreal, Hopper-esque glow. In this low contrast light everything framed in my long lens seemed composed in a harmony of ocean sea greens.

Rainy Season Greens II Gunma 2020

Another composition in greens designed to illustrate the new growth in the mountains near Mt. Shirane in the early summer, during this year’s extraordinarily long rainy season. In fact, a light rain was falling and the leaves were turned even as I composed this image. Japan is, of course, both blessed and occasionally cursed by abundant rainfall, but this was the first year I can remember when the intensity of the summer greens here rivaled that of Ireland.

Manza Autumn Gunma 2017.jpg

The Manza Highway follows rising ridge lines from the Tsumgoi valley into the Kusatsu-Shirane mountain massif, and as it reaches higher elevations Japanese white and silver birches begin to appear among the darker beeches and maples along the road. On this crisp October morning I pulled off the road attracted by this particularly bright and isolated silvery trunk set against orange leaves glowing in brightly overcast morning light. The wind was brisk and I had to wait a long time for the brief moment when I could make this exposure with enough depth of field to show off the procession of color all the way into the background.