next exhibition： current exhibition： Tomoko Yoneda     "After the Thaw"   Sep. 10, Sat. – Oct. 1, Sat., 2005 Closed on Mon., Sun. and National holidays Tomoko Yoneda    Lovers, Dunaújváros (formerly Stalin City), Hungary  2004, C-type print SHUGOARTS presents new works solo show, "After the Thaw", by Tomoko Yoneda. The artist was born in Akashi, Hyogo in1965. She lives and works in London after her graduation from Photography Department, The UIC (University of Illinois at Chicago) School of Art and Design in 1989, as well as Royal College of Arts in 1991. She had a solo show, "Beyond Memory and Uncertainty", at Shiseido Gallery in 2003, and participated in a group show "NON-SECT RADICAL Contemporary Photography III" at Yokohama Museum of Art in 2004.In Feburary 2005, she had a solo show, "A Decade After", at Ashiya City Museum of Art & History. This exhibition was composed of photographs of Kobe City, where is near her hometown. She took photographs of the town right after earthquake disaster in 1995 and a decade after from the earthquake. This series of photographs will be exhibited at "Yokohama Triennale 2005" that is going to open at the end of September 2005, and her works are attracting attention. "Memory" and "Time" are the basic theme of Yoneda's art works. With her earlier series called "Topographical Analogy", she photographed empty houses that were about to be demolished and tried to capture traces of people who used to live there as well as their daily lives.For her "Between Visible and Invisible" series, she picked up several intellectual people, who played active parts in 19th - 20th centuries, and photographed their handwritings, that have significant meanings to their lives, through their eyeglasses. Her recent series called "Scene" is composed of photographs look like casual ordinary landscapes, but they are actually landscape photographs of the sites where historical events had happened. Although her sense of “Memory” and “Time” changed during her motif was shifting from anonymity to historical characters and to historical places, she has been consistently trying to capture “the things don’t come out in the pictures” as her main subject. In the background of these purposely well-composed photographs, there are hidden true stories that we can hardly imagine from... With this series, Yoneda is indicating us the danger of leaving historical memories behind by enjoying the beautiful images. The artist is suggesting us that we can sincerely live in the present time without fading the memories by being always aware of the truth that time is consistently passing and histories are being rewritten. She picked up two countries as main subjects of her new works. One is “Water” as leitmotif, Republic of Hungary, which has a history of being at the mercy of neighboring larger countries. The other is “Forest” as leitmotif, Republic of Estonia, which is still dozen years since gained independent from Soviet. In those countries, a lot of remnants of communist-era are still much in evidence in the town. There is also a peninsula where used to be a scene of a battle and used as a military base until quite recent. Yoneda beautifully transfers afterimage of redundant ideology, which was caused from the political system difference, to her frames. Her perspective is not only about beauty but passionate and inmost. These new works are going to be published as a photo-book series “In-between” as a part of “Europe Today” project, hosted by EU Japan Fest Japan Committee. atrist's page >> "After the Thaw" all works>> back to exhibitions Copyright 2003 SHUGOARTS. All rights reserved. contact: SHUGOARTS info@shugoarts.com SHUGOARTS website since2003 designed by Kaori Hoya, Created by Kaneko Osamu