Hiroshi Sugimoto
Hiroshi Sugimoto
Hiroshi Sugimoto, born on February 23, 1948, is a Japanese photographer currently dividing his time between Tokyo, Japan and New York City, United States. His catalogue is made up of a number of series, each having a distinct theme and similar attributes...
believe people paradise
Many people [still] believe that at the time of your death, 1,000 Buddhas show up and welcome you into the paradise state.
religious believe animal
I want to put it back together now, this artistic expression that contains religious feeling. I want to investigate: What was the origin? What's happened in the human mind? Can we trace back the moment of the creation of human consciousness? And why did only humans gain consciousness, not other animals? So, evolution? I don't know whether or not I can believe evolution. Maybe we wait for another 100,000 years and then apes get consciousness.
photography believe reading
People have been reading photography as a true document, at the same time they are now getting suspicious. I am basically an honest person, so I let the camera capture whatever it captures whether you believe it or not is up to you; it’s not my responsibility, blame my camera, not me.
photography lying believe
Humans have changed the landscape so much, but images of the sea could be shared with primordial people. I just project my imagination on to the viewer, even the first human being. I think first and then imagine some scenes. Then I go out and look for them. Or I re-create these images with my camera. I love photography because photography is the most believable medium. Painting can lie, but photography never lies: that is what people used to believe.
garden zen
It's pre-photography, a fossilization of time, ... Americans have done the Zen garden to death. I wanted to do something different.
call material means opposite research
I call it the New Material Research Laboratory, which means just the opposite - that it is about old techniques,
christian buddhist america
I don't know how many serious Christians exist here in America, but the Japanese, the younger generation is leaving the Buddhist religion mentality behind.
age example tools
I have no policy for my collection. For example, there's a bunch of meteorite [on the windowsill in my studio]. I touch it and I feel the energy from the universe. I have a 1/1,000th of a fragment of stone-age tools and pottery and debris. I can learn many things from my collection. Actually, the 1,000 Buddha, I wanted to buy it, but it's a National Treasure, so I couldn't. If you cannot buy it, just photograph it!
art values
My art has gained some high value.
australia museums offering
I don't know whether the future or 2018 exists or not, but if it exists, I'm offering a show to a museum in Australia titled "Time Reversed." Time is going backwards.
buddhist ideas life-and-death
[I'm concerned with] aesthetics and this idea of how the passage between life and death goes. I can visually present that by borrowing this Buddhist statue.
moving dying movement
Life is one passage and then you keep moving into another state. It's like you might be reborn, but the process of being born you won't remember - the same way that the dying process is a slow movement from consciousness to unconsciousness.
moving life-is states
Life is one passage and then you keep moving into another state.
buddhist moving world
The Buddhist concept is that it takes 48 days to get near this state [of death]. So it's a slow process, moving into, not a permanent death, but the world of the dead.