If there’s one country that Western eyes tend to perceive only through clichés, it’s Japan. Photographer Roberto Badin has set out to break down these clichés with “Inside Japan”, a unique work that takes us to the heart of Japanese cities, to help us grasp all the subtleties and contrasts of this nation.
And why? Because during his childhood, spent in Brazil, little Roberto was bathed in cartoons from the land of the rising sun. “Japan was like a distant planet. I dreamed of going there, just as you dream of walking on Jupiter or Mars. My relationship with the Japanese people has always been very sensory. One of my first works as a photographer was commissioned by Kenzô Takada. Perhaps, without realising it, it was decisive for the rest of my career.”
Forget the effervescent, light-filled megalopolis that lives at 200 an hour. Instead, the artist focuses on contemporary architecture, everyday life and solitude, using structured, graphic framing around deliberately isolated silhouettes. A way of questioning the relationship between the human being and the environment. Published by Editions Benjamin Blanck, the book catalogues several small, singular scenes: a teenage girl enclosed in a frame of light, two Yakuza silhouettes at the heart of a sublime composition, a young woman hidden and at the same time highlighted by her immaculate umbrella against a background of grey concrete. These are stories brimming with beauty and urgently worth discovering.
https://www.instagram.com/robertobadin/
France – Paris