Mikiya Takimoto "Lumiere / Priere" （Tassel Hotel Sanjo Shirakawa）

Mikiya Takimoto "Lumiere / Priere"

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Artists

Mikiya Takimoto

In early 2020, the global spread of the new coronavirus infection forced people to drastically reduce contact with others and to confine themselves to their homes and other limited spaces. Mikiya Takimoto, who has lived with photography all his life, was also forced to stop all work involving many people, and was also unable to travel around the world and take large-scale photographs as he had done in the past.

At that time, I happened to see rape blossoms blooming in the field. I wondered how the lives and memories of these small plants, which sprout repeatedly as the seasons change, are connected. In order to explore the “microcosm” that lives inside the plants, I looked at the wildflowers with a single small camera, and the series became “LUMIÈRE” (“light” in French).

Meanwhile, in the fall of 2020. In Kyoto, while participating in the International Photography Festival, Takimoto encountered the word “Enyu"" (a Buddhist term), which means that all things completely dissolve into one another and do not interfere with each other. When he visited temples and shrines in the ancient capital, which had lost their popularity and stood in silence, he felt himself connected to the flow of time, which has continued uninterruptedly from the past to the present and into the future. In order to capture this continuity, I walked around temples and photographed them, resulting in the series “PRIÈRE” (French for “prayer”). These two new works were created by a photographer who has been fascinated by and expressed his fascination with planets, the universe, and life, and who has rediscovered the joy of photography.

We invite you to discover the world of Mikiya Takimoto's work, which has taken a new turn after the Corona Disaster.