Kansuke Yamamoto: Conveyor of the Impossible

Kansuke Yamamoto: Conveyor of the Impossible was a 2001 retrospective exhibition on the work of the Japanese photographer and poet Kansuke Yamamoto, held at Tokyo Station Gallery from 22 August to 24 September 2001.[1][2][3] It was organized by the East Japan Railway Culture Foundation and East Japan Railway Company.[1][2] The exhibition presented around 200 photographs, centered on recently rediscovered original prints, together with around 100 related materials, including drawings and issues of the Surrealist poetry magazine Yoru no Funsui.[1][4]

Exhibition

The catalogue greeting presented the exhibition as an introduction to Yamamoto's work through photographs, drawings, and documentary materials, and described him as an early figure in Surrealist photography in Japan.[4] It also summarized his activities in the Independent Photography Research Association, the magazine Yoru no Funsui, and the group Nagoya Photo Avant-Garde.[4] The acknowledgements section credited, among others, John Solt, Ryūichi Kaneko, Nagoya City Art Museum, and members of Yamamoto's family for assistance in realizing the exhibition.[5]

Catalogue

The accompanying catalogue, Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible, was edited by Toshio Yamamoto, Takeo Inada, and Haruko Tanaka under the supervision of John Solt and Ryūichi Kaneko, and was published in 2001 by the East Japan Railway Culture Foundation.[2][3] Library records describe it as a bilingual exhibition catalogue of 237 pages plus a 79-page documentary supplement.[2][3]

In addition to an opening greeting and acknowledgements, the volume included Ryūichi Kaneko's essay "Yamamoto Kansuke's Position: Toward a Re-reading of Modern Japanese Photography" (pp. 8–17) and John Solt's "Perception, Misperception, Nonperception" (pp. 19–67).[4][5][6][7] It also contained a chronology of Yamamoto's life and work compiled by Toshio Yamamoto (pp. 198–227) and a checklist of works (pp. 228–237).[8][2][3]

Kaneko's essay argued that research undertaken for the exhibition made it possible to redating Yamamoto's collage Development of the Thought of a Human ... Mist and Bedroom to 1932, and used that finding to reconsider both Yamamoto's early career and Nagoya's place in the formation of modern Japanese photography.[6] Solt's essay placed Yamamoto in relation to both French and Japanese Surrealism, discussed the neglect of his work in photographic historiography, and treated the suppression of Yoru no Funsui as part of the wartime policing of Surrealist expression in Japan.[7] Solt also described the volume as the first substantial book devoted to Yamamoto's work.[7]

The chronology records that the catalogue was issued in conjunction with the Tokyo Station Gallery exhibition and notes that a special edition of sixteen copies was also published privately by Toshio Yamamoto.[8]

Reception and legacy

An advance feature by Taylor Mignon, "A 'subversive' finally brought in from the cold", appeared in The Japan Times on 15 August 2001, shortly before the exhibition opened.[9] In a later English-language essay on Yamamoto, Eiko Aoki wrote that the exhibition was seen by 9,000 visitors.[10] A contributor note in the catalogue states that John Solt's efforts to bring Yamamoto's photographic work to the attention of Tokyo Station Gallery's curators helped lead to the exhibition.[11]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 "写真展 シュルレアリスト 山本悍右". Tokyo Station Gallery exhibition archive (in Japanese). East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. Retrieved 5 April 2026.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 "山本悍右 : シュルレアリスト : 不可能の伝達者 : 写真展". National Diet Library Search (in Japanese). Retrieved 5 April 2026.
  3. 1 2 3 4 "写真展シュルレアリスト山本悍右". Shōwakan Digital Archive (in Japanese). Retrieved 5 April 2026.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko, eds. (2001). Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible (in Japanese and English). Supervised by John Solt and Ryūichi Kaneko. Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. p. unpaginated.
  5. 1 2 Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko, eds. (2001). Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible (in Japanese and English). Supervised by John Solt and Ryūichi Kaneko. Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. p. unpaginated.
  6. 1 2 Kaneko, Ryūichi (2001). "山本悍右の位置―日本近代写真を読み換えるために―". In Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko (eds.). Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible (in Japanese). Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. pp. 8–17.
  7. 1 2 3 Solt, John (2001). "Perception, Misperception, Nonperception". In Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko (eds.). Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible. Translated by Tetsuya Taguchi. Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. pp. 19–67.
  8. 1 2 Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko, eds. (2001). "山本悍右年譜". Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible (in Japanese). Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. pp. 198–227.
  9. ↑ Mignon, Taylor (15 August 2001). "A 'subversive' finally brought in from the cold". The Japan Times. Retrieved 5 April 2026.
  10. ↑ Aoki, Eiko. "Behind the Folding Screen of "Japan's Modern Divide"". Kyoto Journal. Retrieved 5 April 2026.
  11. ↑ Yamamoto, Toshio; Inada, Takeo; Tanaka, Haruko, eds. (2001). Yamamoto Kansuke: Conveyor of the Impossible. Supervised by John Solt and Ryūichi Kaneko. Tokyo: East Japan Railway Culture Foundation. p. 67.
This page is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.