The Incomplete Araki: Sex, Life, and Death in the Works of Nobuyoshi Araki

About

Nobuyoshi Araki (1940–) has worked for nearly 50 years to complicate and challenge the role of intimacy in photography. His commitment to the idea that it should be immediate, unflinching, and deeply personal has resulted in a body of work that ranges from the most sexually explicit and controversial photographs to those that expose the vulnerability of love and loss. The installation is accompanied by the personal perspectives of collaborators, muses, critics, fans, and fellow photographers as well as historical artifacts which situate Araki’s work within the social context of art history and postwar Japanese society. Over 400 books, 150 prints and 500 hundred Polaroids are on view–exploring concepts like obsession, ritual, kinbaku-bi, sentimentality, photographer and subject, and of course, controversy.

“I want to make photographs that maintain their incompleteness. I don’t want them to lose their reality, presence, speed, heat, or humidity. Therefore, I stop and shoot before they become refined or sophisticated.” – Nobuyoshi Araki