RIE
YAMAMOTO
photographer
ISSUE 0 2023 SS
Rie Yamamoto has been traveling to various places with her camera. She has lived in London, Los Angeles and Paris and now she has no address. A Wanderer.She recorded and documented the sunrise in Paris, capturing each image instantly on Polaroid, sensing that the white edge of the photograph represented a window frame for the world outside; an image of the world as perceived from her point of view. These photographs reflect her subtle and beautiful world.
The sky changes color and appearance every second – a contrail appears after an airplane passes, a bird flies over the sky, and sunlight reflects on a window across the street. These changes happen just a couple of minutes before the sunrise.
Suddenly, I have a powerful realization that I am standing in front of the window of my apartment in Paris and am seeing the sky now, in this very moment. Maybe the strength of this feeling is borne from having rarely been settled in one place for long. Even if I stay in one place, I never experience the sensation of living the same life; everyday feels different.
These photos are the material manifestation of the sense that I was definitely in Paris at that moment.
The photos are of the morning sky just before the sunrise at a time in my life when I was constantly commuting between Paris and Japan. Some of them are the summer sky, and others are winter. It depended on the season, but in general I took them between 7:00 and 8:30 in the morning.
While taking these photos, I was reminded of the series of paintings called ‘Today’ by Japanese conceptual artist On Kawara depicting dates and years. I thought that it would be interesting if the titles of my photos were the time the photo was captured, and that it would be nice for the title to spark curiosity about the season the photo was taken in. Therefore, I always recorded the time each photo was taken.
I tend not to think I want to become somebody. The reason might be because I was enormously influenced by the poem ‘Rain won’t’ by Japanese poet Kenji Miyazawa, which I memorized when I was in elementary school.
If the sky can change its expression in such a variety of ways and still be recognized as sky, then I also, no matter what I do, am still just me.
I wrote the sentence above when I was looking back at my photos of the sky which had been changing every second, and I realized that I do not need to become somebody, and if so, paradoxically I could become somebody. In other words, I just should be myself.
Questionnaire
1
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What do you do?
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Vagabond
2
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Tell us what you love the most about your job.
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Each job is different in content, members, etc. It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
3
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What made you start your current job?
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Guided by the inevitability of the overlap of coincidences.
4
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Who are the most influential persons in your life?
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When I was 19 years old, I traveled to Yakushima. Then I happened to meet a young man who traveled around the world and he kept a silky chicken in an old house with a thatched roof and fire in the hearth like a Japanese folk tale.
Listening to his ups and downs life, I learned that nature and the world will always gave us what we needed in perfect time.
5
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Describe yourself in 3 words
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Wanderer, Hyperactive, Optimist
6
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What is the thing that you are very interested in now?
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Japanese traditional culture
7
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What are three things you cannot live without?
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Freedom, Lovely precious friends, Impressively tasty good foods
8
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What makes you feel good?
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When I experience something new for the first time.
9
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What are the essential things you wear?
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Noting special
10
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What do you always have on you?
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Film Camera
11
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Tell us about your morning routine.
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Drink a cup of black coffee.
12
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What do you get immersed in, losing track of time?
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Whatever I am interested in at the moment.
13
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What is the ultimate luxury for you?
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When I travel for good food.
14
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When do you feel stimulated or inspired?
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When I get to know a new side of my friends that I didn’t know before.
15
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What were you passionate about when you were younger?
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Travel and new encounters.
16
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What is your favorite color?
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Purple
17
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What is the most important decision you have made in your life?
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It is constantly being updated.
Decisions made at this moment are the most important to me.
18
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What was the most moving moment in your life?
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When I saw the 360-degree star-filled starry sky at lake Uyuni, which also reflected on the surface of the water.
19
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Please tell me about the books or movies that you were engrossed in when you were a child.
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Any new book that had just come into the library that no one had read yet.
(I liked to borrow first the books that had not yet been stamped with a checkout stamp.)
20
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What is the most recent book you have finished reading?
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What book are you reading right now?
Homo Ludens / Johan Huizinga
De brevitate vitae / Lucius Annaeus Seneca
21
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Who is your favorite author?
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Banana Yoshimoto
22
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What are your three favorite books on the bookshelf?
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The Book of Tea / Kakuzo Okakura
The Sense of Wonder / Rachel Carson
Nurtured by Love / Shinichi Suzuki
23
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Where would you like to go for a trip?
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Alaska
24
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Which country would you like to visit in the future?
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Pakistan
25
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Where is your favorite hotel?
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Yuyado Sakamoto / Ishikawa, JAPAN
26
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What is the most memorable place you've visited?
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Socotra Island
27
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What is your favorite recent song?
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Kajyadhi-fu bushi / Jun Arasaki and Nine Sheep
28
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Who’s your favorite singer?
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Ahmad Jamal
29
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What is the one song you can listen to all the time?
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Waltz for Debby / Bill Evans Trio
30
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Which movie do you watch over and over again?
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Any films by Hayao Miyazaki.
31
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What are your three favorite movies?
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I Don't Want to Sleep Alone / Tsai Ming-liang
The Fall / Tarsem Singh
Toni Erdmann / Maren Ade
32
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What are some of your favorite movies you've seen recently?
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You, the Living / Roy Andersson
33
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When you meet someone for the first time, what is the first point that catches your eye?
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Eyes
34
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What is the best advice you have received from people?
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Believe in yourself.
35
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What do you wear in bed?
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Brooks Brothers Nightshirts
