Nobuyoshi Araki

Nobuyoshi Araki was born in 1940 in Tokyo, where he lives and works. After photography and film studies at Chiba University, worked for the Dentsu advertising agency. Araki may be the most well-known portrayer of Tokyo since the early 70s, (in)famous for his controversial, voyeuristic and deeply intimate photographs. Not only does he refer in his photography to classics, as Man Ray, Brassaï or Cartier-Bresson, but also to traditional Japanese art from Edo-period. Araki was included in “The 10th Contemporary Art Exhibition of Japan” (1971) and, then, in a number of solo and group exhibitions including the Venice Biennale (1979, 2007), São Paulo Biennale (1998, 2002) or “Cities on the move” (1998) in PS1, Museum of Modern Art, New York. The tensions between mortality and vitality are the leading topics of his œuvre, presented in the most recognized series, “Sentimental Journey” (1990), in which he depicted death of his wife Yoko. Also in “Tokyo Love” (1994), a collaboration with American photographer, Nan Goldin. In December 2019 Nobuyoshi exhibited his vintage photographs with the exhibition title Impossible Love, at the CO museum in Berlin. Nobuyoshi Araki now lives and works in Tokyo.