Tokyo morning commute
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- antimotion0
Thanks for the post - not sure about the gaijin thing, whenever I visit I've never felt uncomfortable. I was in a paper store once and an older lady actually said to a friend "Oh, gaijin!" but no harm done. I believe that the store was just off the beaten path and not many outsiders visit so she was surprised.
Anyhow, the photos are amazing so whether or not people view as a "gaijin" looking at Japanese, or just beautiful images that have been captured is up to them. Art is objective and deserves a point of view, that's the point.
- HijoDMaite0
antimotion
http://www.photoeye.com/bookstor…
Last year, I reviewed a show of Michael Wolf photographs at Bruce Silverstein in New York. The exhibition was broad, and included many a large-scale mega-print, but I was most interested in some small images of Tokyo metro-riders, their faces squished up against the window-glass like an inverted version of pressed ham. The photos are both voyeuristic and intimate, which is no small feat. As a man who left New York partly because my soul was slowly erased by too many hours spent underground, (watching the rats copulate), I relate to something primal in these photographs. But they’re also fantastic as a method of resuscitating portraiture, because you really haven’t seen a group of pictures just like this before. Needless to say, the photos have re-surfaced, in the proper small scale, as a book called “Tokyo Compression Revisited,” published by Asia One and Peperoni Books. The plates are meditative and absurd at the same time, which is a terrific mix. And the back cover features a dude giving the finger to the photographer, which must have happened more than once, right? Think about it. You’re squeezed from all sides by strangers, some salary-man has his armpit smushed up inside your nostrils, and then you look out the window at some gaijin photographer documenting your misery? You’d give him the finger too.
Bottom line: Spot on
- dopepope0
It's a horrible, dreadful way to begin your day, every day.
- OSFA0
wonder how many babies are conceived this way...
- stoplying0
Supposedly on the packed trains, the commuters envision themselves in their own spacious bubble to help with the crowding.
- Frosty_spl0
I'd rather do that than sit through an hour of traffic every morning.
- not in the summer you dontepill
- Ladies loves itPeter
- least you can sleep on a train, or molestanimatedgif
- lol gifernexbcn
- you forgot: or be molestedernexbcn
- tOki0
In my travels of japan and during the time I lived there I only saw the station attendants pushing people in once. What's more common though is for people to simply walk back slowly shuffling and pushing people to make room as they creep into the door. This happens even when the train is completely packed. No one speaks and everyone looks for a blank spot in the distance that they can look at without making eye contact. It's not uncommon for the doors to not be able to close because someone's bag or clothes get stuck lol.
Considering how crammed up they all get every day, most people are very well natured on the trains. You find that once people are in stations however, they are much more impatient and more likely to knock you..
- typist0
- wowsea_sea
- Thats it! - thanksantimotion
- ick. Steamy face on glass is making me ill.soundsinsilence
- antimotion0
Thanks for the posts, but not quite what I was looking for -
The images are pretty much like the one I posted, however it was a series.Many were close ups of people, breath on the window, glaring eyes - very interesting.
Anyhow, thanks for your time.
Night all.
- sureshot0
I have fucking claustrofobia. I would have panic attacks.
- You'd be amazed what the human body and mind can get used to.Peter
- grow up, fucking baby,animatedgif
- No, I'm with you sureshot. Only do the tube when strictly needed.
Panic attacks aren't about being babyish ffs.Eighty - being babyish ffs.Eighty