Reiko Imoto : ‘Visions of The Other Side’ Series (Photography)

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These images are straight and non-staged. I used traditional 35mm camera with Tri-X 400 film,
whilst all of the images are printed as silver gelatin on 16″x 20″ Agfa classic fiber base paper.

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‘Feather’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Déjà vu’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘The Edge of a Memory’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Still Alive’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Mannequins Dream’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Vegetation’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Eclipse’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Civilisation’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Cloudy Room’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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‘Secret’
Gelatin silver prints
16 x 20 inches
2011
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These images represent surreal moments that I see in everyday life. On the street, or wherever I go, the hidden side of ordinary things attract my eye. To me, photography is a tool to expand ways of seeing the mysteries that I used to see easily when I was a little child. I am not interested in a documentation of reality, but I recognize my photography as its own imaginative reality. As adults, we are forced to face to one big reality that everybody shares in the society. Our life styles with advanced technologies have taken away the abilities to see the everyday magic.; we are too busy to play with our own inner realities. With my body of work, I have tried to collect and portray my inner reality of the subconscious world. I have never been able to use words to explain or express the unexpected feelings that I get from the visions of mysteries. My own reality takes place between the outside world and my imaginary world. I have to catch the “visions of the other side” carefully with my camera before they disappear. If we open mind’s eye widely, it is possible to see surreal moments that bring a fresh air into everyday life; poetic mysteries can be everywhere. [Artist Statement : Visions of the Other Side]

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Reiko Imoto : Website

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Ben Ali Ong : Photography Series

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‘Black Sun (The Art of Dying)’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Black Sun (The Art of Dying)’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Refluent Hours’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Refluent Hours’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Black Sun (The Art of Dying)’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Ballads of the Dead and Dreaming’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Songs for Sorrow’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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‘Songs for Sorrow’
Photography Series
Ben Ali Ong
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Throughout my work I have been primarily interested in the suggestive possibilities between the images, and the open narrative I can create by juxtaposing the interior and exterior world beside each other. Portraits next to landscape, for example, and the tension between these two environments. Whilst there are reoccurring motifs and symbols that appear throughout, the importance is on mood, metaphor and emotion, and how different subjects can both carry these feelings and somehow come together, creating my own ambiguous black and white world – similar in a way to the surrealist 1920′s film noir. Birds are frequent symbols that appear throughout the work. Inspired by mythology, they assume a variety of roles. They have been symbols of power and freedom throughout the ages, and are seen to link the human world to the divine. Silhouetted birds in the cloud scape, brooding vistas, faces emerging from darkness, all come together in an attempt to produce an imaginative and mysterious landscape. Early visual influences for me have been Caravaggio and Francis Bacon, beginning with a general attraction to the darker sensibilities of each artists work and it’s sometimes macabre nature. The use of stark, direct lighting and heavy shadows in Caravaggio’s paieces, as well Bacon’s apparent painted ‘blur’ have both made their technical influences. By shooting 35mm black and white film and layering negatives together during the scanning stage, as well as the use of surface scratching and inscriptions to the negative, I try evoke a dream like detachment of an earlier age. BAO

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Ben Ali Ong : Website

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