ARTIFACTS

Artist Mitsuhito Takeuchi is providing a bit of artistic excitement to the drab environment of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building in Shinjuku. Takeuchi is best known in Japan for public art pieces, like decking out several trains in Kochi Prefecture, Shikoku, with wild colors and designs. As part of a new project, which is designed to stimulate energy and creativity within the hallowed government halls, the artist has created a large dynamic sculptural painting that delivers a colorful blow to the perfunctory lobby of one of Japan's largest office spaces. The piece is on display in Building 1 of the Metropolitan Government building until September 3. AC

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By Jeff Michael Hammond

Paris and Klein

An photographer famed for his portraits of New York takes a look at Paris

EXISTENCE, Paris, 1995

New York-born photographer William Klein caused a sensation in the ’50s with his stark and sometimes crude and violent imagery of the city in his 1954 book Life is Good, and Good for You in New York. Rejecting both the dominant classical look of Cartier-Bresson and others, and also the common “fly-on-the-wall” approach to documentary, Klein actively engaged himself with his subjects, often to the point of thrusting the camera in their faces.

It was a daring first step into the art world, and one that was rewarded with ridicule and accusations of “photographic incompetence.”

Klein continued undeterred, even accepting commissions for fashion work—his surreal imagery adding to the repertoire of the fledgling art form. Since the ’50s, Klein, today an active 76-year-old, has lived predominantly in Paris.

Photographs of his adopted city from the ’60s through the last few years are the subject of a new exhibition, “Paris and Klein,” at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography in Ebisu.

Some of Klein’s Paris works share the blurred chaos of his early New York photos. Applied to the colorful shapes of dancers at a carnival, this technique can enhance the sense of chaos, but it isn’t as effective when shooting a rugby match.

Autoportrait, 1994

When photographing people on the street rather than individuals, Klein seems most concerned with taking shots of crowds or small groups, often at demonstrations or parades. At times he manages to catch some interesting scenes and facial expressions, as in a shot of high school girls demonstrating in 1966, but few of the photographs here manage to capture that defining moment the way other icons of contemporary photography managed to.

Untypical of Klein is a posed studio shot we see early in the exhibition—a black-and-white print of Serge Gainsbourg with striking red lips for his 1984 album, Love on the Beat. The image is all grainy, stark contrast, the lips more likely having been painted in afterwards than the result of Serge applying lipstick.

Klein was generally not comfortable with studio work. Even when tackling fashion photography, he preferred taking the models out and placing them in unusual situations. One of his tricks, seen here in Isabella & the Opera & White Faces, Paris 1963, was to place the model in a crowd whose constituent faces were later painted out, giving further emphasis to the model.

In a work of images taken at fairgrounds from

Brazilian Dancer, Carnavalcade, Saint-Denis, Paris, 2000

2000, the rides and the people on them are treated almost as abstract shapes. Perhaps some of the playfulness Klein found in fashion photography fed back into his other work. This is one of a number of pieces in which Klein paints and/or includes the perforated strip of Kodak film around the image, which is thereby rendered just one element of a bigger design.

Klein’s visual documents of mixed marriages, Rubenesque women in bathhouses, or techno parties under the Eiffel Tower are interesting enough, but considering his elevated status in the world of photography, we might have expected some more explosive imagery from this godfather of photography. Perhaps the New Yorker found his greatest inspiration closer to home after all.

Until Oct 6, ¥800 (adults), ¥700 (students). Ebisu Garden Place, 1-13-3 Mita, Meguro-ku. Tel: 03-3280-0033. Open Sat-Wed 10am-6pm, Thurs-Fri 10am-8pm. Nearest stn: Ebisu (Ebisu Garden Place exit). www.syabi.com

Photo credits: © William Klein