Osamu Yokonami - Small Town
Staged on a farm in rural Japan, externaling Higashikawa in Hokkaido, Osamu Yokonami’s (b. 1967, Japanese) images demonstrate his particular use of photography as an artistic medium. Working with straightforward camera angles, Yokonami transforms ordinary bodies, farming tools and the local produce into haunting images—unexpectedly absurd and familiar. Headless figures, an aubergine-masked face, an abandoned baby on a paper bag, a topless character submissively kneeling in the grass while balancing two large tomatoes on their back.
The series suggests a performative and complicit moment between the photographer and the people portrayed. As one feels the vulnerability of the subject facing the lens, one wonders: who is playing who in this image?
Staged on a farm in rural Japan, externaling Higashikawa in Hokkaido, Osamu Yokonami’s (b. 1967, Japanese) images demonstrate his particular use of photography as an artistic medium. Working with straightforward camera angles, Yokonami transforms ordinary bodies, farming tools and the local produce into haunting images—unexpectedly absurd and familiar. Headless figures, an aubergine-masked face, an abandoned baby on a paper bag, a topless character submissively kneeling in the grass while balancing two large tomatoes on their back.
The series suggests a performative and complicit moment between the photographer and the people portrayed. As one feels the vulnerability of the subject facing the lens, one wonders: who is playing who in this image?
Staged on a farm in rural Japan, externaling Higashikawa in Hokkaido, Osamu Yokonami’s (b. 1967, Japanese) images demonstrate his particular use of photography as an artistic medium. Working with straightforward camera angles, Yokonami transforms ordinary bodies, farming tools and the local produce into haunting images—unexpectedly absurd and familiar. Headless figures, an aubergine-masked face, an abandoned baby on a paper bag, a topless character submissively kneeling in the grass while balancing two large tomatoes on their back.
The series suggests a performative and complicit moment between the photographer and the people portrayed. As one feels the vulnerability of the subject facing the lens, one wonders: who is playing who in this image?
-
24,5 x 28,5 cm. 64 pages + printed endpapers. 34 color plates. Offset printed clothbound hardcover. Linen thread bound. Coral headband. Authentic tip-in image on front cover with typography on front cover, spine and back cover in green foil.
ISBN 978–91–88113–62–7
Published in 2023
-
Libraryman, founded in 2008 in Stockholm, Sweden by Tony Cederteg, produces and publishes contemporary photobooks by initiating a preserving liaison with artistic perceptions from varied paths. Sans intrusion of prevailing trends, Libraryman embraces its titles as intimate, ageless and prolonged poems—drawing inspiration from concise printed matters, unspoken language and an immense romanticism for the vocation.
Central to the idea of Libraryman is to serve as a complementary hand to the artist’s vision; with unobtrusive design and interwoven tactility this collaborative effort ensures that both the artist and the publisher will never sacrifice their carefully crafted identities.
