The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (MOMAT) is pleased to present the special exhibition Nakahira Takuma: Burn—Overflow, from February 6 to April 7, 2024.

 

First major retrospective in nearly twenty years of a legendary photographer who changed Japanese photography

Nakahira Takuma (1938–2015) was a photographer who made a significant mark in both production and theory from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s, a turning point in postwar Japanese photography. His presence has greatly inspired photographers of his generation, such as Moriyama Daido and Shinoyama Kishin, and has also had a profound influence on succeeding generations, including Homma Takashi. Nakahira’s career is marked by dramatic episodes: the intense images of are, bure, boke (grainy, blurry, out-of-focus) published in Provoke magazine and other publications in the late 1960s; his self-criticism and declaration of directional change in his 1973 collection of writings Why an Illustrated Botanical Dictionary?; and his coma and amnesia in 1977, and his recovery. While these narratives highlighted Nakahira’s presence, however, they also fixed his image and obscured the details of his work.

This exhibition will carefully trace Nakahara’s work and reexamine its development. In particular, it will focus on his work during the period of exploration that began around 1975 and ended in 1977 because of his illness and consider again the positioning of his work after his recovery.

Even after the photographer’s death in 2015, interest in his work has continued to grow both nationally and internationally. Presenting 400 works and materials spanning his entire career, this long-awaited exhibition traces the trajectory of Nakahira’s thinking and practice on photography, which still raises questions we cannot overlook even today.

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Date
February 6–April 7, 2024

Time
10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. (Fridays and Saturdays open until 20:00 p.m.)
*Last admission : 30 minutes before closing.

Closed
Mondays (except February 12, March 25), February 13

Ticket
Adults 1,500yen / College and university students 1,000yen
Admission is free for high school students, under 18, and those with Disability Certificates and one caregiver accompanying each of them.

Website
Nakahira Takuma: Burn—Overflow – The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo (momat.go.jp)