"I come from outside the photographic circle and the norms of photography don't pique my interest... There are some things that you can do with a camera and not with any other medium... Grain, contrast, blur, skewed framing, deliberate subtraction or exaggeration of gray tones, etc. I think it's great to show the various possibilities of photography, and it also shows that taking a camera this way is as effective as any traditional way of contact. ”
—William Klein
Born in 1928, William Klein, who never received a formal photography education, broke many of Bresson's norms of "decisive moments", and his photography preferred not to target the subject, but only to see what was happening in the moment.
He believes that good street photography should not only have a photo of an interesting person, but also need this photo to have a "sense of presence" image symbols, which can interpret and represent local cultural phenomena and let the viewer explore the meaning of connotation. Klein once said that he had always taken a diary-like relaxed and casual attitude, capturing his feelings, and that photos that were too serious or complex were not what he wanted. His feature photographs of a city, such as the 1950-1960 albums of New York, Rome, Paris, and Moscow, usually end in a short period of 3 months, which many photographers may not be able to complete for several years.
"Photography is not so much a record as photography is a memory, a process of accumulating a series of memories. At the same time, it is also a fossil of time, and it is also a myth of light and shadow. ”
- Moriyama Avenue
Born in 1938, Moriyama Daichi began working as a freelance designer in Osaka after his father died unexpectedly in a train crash at the age of 20, then became a freelance designer in Osaka, and later became a freelance designer inspired by William Klein's work New York, became a personal assistant to photographer Hideko Hosoe in 1961, and became a freelance photographer three years later, rising in the 1960s and 1970s at the same time as Tosuto Ishiuchi and Shusuke Araki.
Light leakage, partial magnification, scratches, spots, shaking, tilting, and loss of focus are often seen in his photographs, which also makes Moriyama as much questioned by the public as William Klein. But he always asks, "Why can your Mannerist images be called photography, but these real and accidental records will be thrown into the wastepaper basket by you?" ”
William Klein and Moriyama Avenue are an excellent pair of examples. They illustrate an interrelationship in photography that can be described in terms of sympathy.
In 2012, Moriyama Avenue won the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Center of Photography in New York and joined William Klein in a retrospective exhibition at the Tate Gallery in London, William Klein + Daido Moriyama, which Tate Modern introduced in the introduction: "William Klein and Moriyama Avenue are two photographers with similar styles, and their works have a strong visual tension, the picture is not only blurry and shaky, but also makes extensive use of coarse-grained visual effects. Most of their work deals with the public sphere in the city. It shows the political tendencies of people on the streets towards a series of urban issues such as anti-war, homosexuality, globalization, and poverty. As photographers, they are committed to visualizing this political inclination to the world.
The gears of time are turned back to 2018 again, because 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT held the exhibition "Photo City - William Klein and the Photographers of the 22nd Century", after thirty years, the 89-year-old William came to Japan again, although he now needs to move in a wheelchair, but the Sony camera in his hand still keeps photographing the people who appear in front of him, and there is a humorous and charming side behind his sharp eyes. Under the impetus of Akio Nagasawa Gallery, the two legendary photographers once again began a dialogue.
Nagasawa: How did you feel when you saw video artist TAKCOM convert more than 200 photographs from William Klein's photographs in New York, Rome, Paris, Moscow, Tokyo, etc., combined with hand-drawn representations on negatives, abstract patterns, and still photographs of films, into large-scale video installations?
William: That's good, I've tried this before to show off.
Nagasawa: But this time the installation was done by others, wouldn't it be more interesting if you were yourself?
William: It might be more boring for me to do it, but it takes a lot of time and effort, and I don't have that time.
Nagasawa: You also shoot video works, so you are familiar with filmmaking.
WILLIAM: That's right.
Moriyama Avenue: When was my second visit to Tokyo?
WILLIAM: After the mid-'80s.
Nagasawa: Tokyo in the mid-1980s has changed dramatically compared to 1961, when you first came to Tokyo to shoot.
William: Yes, in 1961, when Tokyo was preparing for the Olympic Games, the streets of Tokyo were very chaotic, but when I stepped on Tokyo's soil again in 2018, the city was once again preparing for the Olympics, and the streets were still the same chaotic, but the "chaos" was like my nostalgia, so Tokyo was just right for me.
Moriyama: I hope to take some shinjuku photos this time.
William: I know Shinjuku, okay, so I'll shoot at your behest (laughs), Sony α camera can synchronize well with my movements, and now I'm shooting with it.
Nagasawa: Are you taking color photos right now?
William: Yes, it's taken in color, sometimes converted to black and white.
Nagasawa: Like Moriyama, color and black and white have their own charms, so when will you decide to use color, when will you decide to use black and white?
William: For example, if I meet people dressed in fancy clothes in Shibuya, I will definitely shoot them in color. For me, Tokyo is like a giant toy that wants to shoot in color anyway. But after shooting, I don't think I should still have the heart to play with color to adjust, so the color control is entrusted to the camera.
Moriyama: I still want to see the pictures of Tokyo that William took.
Nagasawa: And I want to see the pictures that William is taking in the present period.
William: Brooklyn (2015) was shot with a digital camera, not a very old work.
Moriyama: Brooklyn is really great.
William: Brooklyn is one of my favorite cities, is Coney Island famous in Japan?
Moriyama: I love it, and I think it's great to shoot Kony Island, and it makes me feel like I want to shoot Shinjuku and Shibuya in this way.
William: Then squeeze out time to shoot! The Chinese characters on the cover of this "Tokyo 1961" were written by me.
Nagasawa: William is also involved in the graphic design of the album, so is the design effect of the cover of the album related to the feeling of the work in the collection?
William: Digital cameras are faster to focus on, and you can confirm photos on the camera, and I really like how quickly digital cameras respond. But design and production, not pressing the shutter to end, is to do a lot of work, which is different from shooting, but the correlation between them has always existed.
Nagasawa: William Klein: Black and Light (2015) The relevance of graphic design to the work is particularly felt.
William: This work was made in 1952, and I painted with light in the darkroom. In another work that uses this approach, in the fashion photograph of In And Out of Fashion, I sketched some outlines of light in the darkroom, asked my assistant to hold the lighting equipment, and finally made the light look like an image of Chinese characters.
William: I would instruct the assistant on how to adjust the light, not so that the words they depicted really meant anything literal, but just used them as a background for my photos.
Nagasawa: Although it was shot in the studio, it looks like it was shot on a street corner.
William: This is Federico Fellini, I took promotional photos for his film La Dolce Vita, and I was very good friends with him, so he invited me to come and take some fashion photos.
WILLIAM: This is my shot of Serge Gansbourg.
Nagasawa: There is a famous photo taken after Gansbu's makeup, is makeup also William's idea?
William: That picture wasn't included in this collection, that was Gainsbourg's idea, his career was not going well at the time, and in order to make a comeback, he decided to appear in a cross-dressing image, and I asked him at the time if it wouldn't be strange to get old and then dress up, and he said no, it made him more beautiful. This photograph is included in my photo collection Mr. Freedom (1969).
Moriyama: This time in Tokyo, every day is very busy, do you have time to take pictures?
William: It's not busy, but it takes some time to do something, like a ride that takes an hour, but I also shot some of my work during the ride, Shibuya, which I went to shoot yesterday.
Moriyama: That's great.
Nagasawa: Do you take some everyday photos when you're out?
William: Basically, I don't shoot because going out is a rare opportunity for me and I shoot my projects as much as I can.
Nagasawa: Are there any ongoing filming projects right now?
WILLIAM: Maybe.
Nagasawa: Do you need to keep it a secret? [Laughs]
William: It's still a secret.
Nagasawa: Then I'm looking forward to seeing this work.
William: Maybe only God knows what it's going to be.
William Klein and Moriyama Avenue photographed at William's apartment when they first met in 1981
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