Shitamichi Motoyuki — À propos — Slash Paris

In the torii series, Shitamichi Motoyuki photographs the remains of once-sacred Shinto gates in places across Asia and the Pacific previously occupied by Japan. The photograph exhibited shows a torii laying on its side and used as a park bench, in Taichung City (Taiwan). Other images from the series show a torii resting in a cemetery covered up by plants, in Saipan (United States) and a gate lost in the landscape, almost invisible, in Sakhalin (Russia). The photographs document the new public purposes and everyday contexts of these abandoned torii that have lost their initial symbolic significance. The physical aspects and positions of the gates record the gradual changes in the daily habits of the people around them and offer chances to contemplate the current meaning of frontiers, territories, and traditions.

Shitamichi Motoyuki’s photographic documents are often a result of serendipity. He lets himself be guided by his various encounters as he traces places where collective memories manifest in or intersect with the lived and shared environment. As a consequence, his works provide opportunities to consider the gradual changes in communities’ daily customs and how they interlace with their physical surroundings.