While Sugimoto is known for his long exposures of seascapes, his writings in Until I am a Ghost provide a clinical yet poetic look at light.
His contemporary, (1938–2015), took this further. In his infamous book For a Language to Come , a series of burned, overexposed images of the sunset are so abstract they resemble scorched paper. Nakahira argued that the sun was too violent to look at directly. His writings were the afterimage —the ghost of the sun burned onto your retina, which is the only place photography really exists.
The anthology features 30 pieces by 19 influential photographers, including: Daido Moriyama & Takuma Nakahira: setting sun writings by japanese photographers
: Diaristic entries and personal reflections from photographers like Takuma Nakahira .
Daido Moriyama is famous for his gritty, blurry, out-of-focus snapshots of urban decay. You might not immediately associate him with sunsets. Yet, when Moriyama shoots the dying sun, it is never a peaceful affair. While Sugimoto is known for his long exposures
"The Provoke Era: Japanese Photography, 1960–1975" Author: Diane Neumaier (Essay in the exhibition catalog of the same name) Summary: This academic paper (often found in the catalog published by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art or Yale University Press) deconstructs the "Setting Sun" mentality as a reaction to the student protests of the 1960s and the "America-juku" (Americanization) of Japan. It explicitly links the gritty, high-contrast black-and-white work of Daido Moriyama to the concept of "erasing the world" to cope with the loss of traditional Japanese identity.
Where Moriyama is chaos, Hiroshi Sugimoto is stillness. In his legendary series Seascapes , Sugimoto reduces the world to two elements: water and sky. There are no landmarks, no boats, no birds. Just the horizon. Nakahira argued that the sun was too violent
Yūyake (The evening glow). It lasts only seven minutes. Make them count.