Kansuke Yamamoto (Surrealist)
Kansuke Yamamoto (山本 悍右, Yamamoto Kansuke, 30 March 1914 – 2 April 1987) was a photographer and poet. He was a prominent Japanese surrealist born in Nagoya, Japan.
Biography
Birth
He was born in Naka-ku, Nagoya, Aichi, Japan. He was the oldest son of Goro Yamamoto(1880–1941), who was the founding member of Aiyu Photography Club. Goro was running a photo studio and a shop selling cameras in Nagoya.
Encounter with Surrealism
He encountered surrealism and dadaism through the poetry magazine "cine´" published by Yamanaka Chiruu who was promoting surrealism in Japan. At the age of 15, he started to write poems. He graduated from the Nagoya Second Commercial School in 1929. That year, he started writing poetry. He left Meiji University School of Arts and letters in Tokyo, where he majored in French Literature before graduation and then went back to Nagoya. In 1931, at the age of 17, he published his works in the Journal "Dokuritsu(Independent)", which was published by "Dokuritsu Shashin Kenkyu Kai(Independent Photography Research Association)".
Kansuke Yamamoto as Surrealist
The oldest of his existing works is called "Aru Ningen no Shisou no Hatten・・・Moya to Shinshitsu(The Developing Thought of a Human...Mist and Bedroom)", which was published in a magazine in 1932. In 1936, he changed his Chinese characters from 勘助(Kansuke) to 悍右(Kansuke). In 1938, he started a surrealist poetry magazine called "Yoru no Funsui(The Night's Fountain)". But the next year, the publication was forced to be discontinued by the authoritative pressure due to the Peace Preservation Law.
In 1939, he formed a group called "Nagoya Photo Avant-Garde" with Tajima Tsugio, Minoru Sakata, Shimozato Yoshio, and Yamanaka Chiruu, etc. The group applied surrealism into their photographs and their avant-garde photography gathered national attention by some magazines like "Photo Times" and "Camera Art". He became a member of "VOU" in 1939, belonging until it was dissolved in 1972. He also formed "VIVI"(1948–1950), "Bijyutsu Bunka Association, Division of Photography"(1949–1954), "Mado(Windows)"(1953–1958), "Honoo(Flame)"(1955–1961), "Subjective Photography Federation of Japan"(1956), "ESPACE"(1956–1958), "Arukishine"(1958), "Avant-Garde Association of Poets"(1958) and "Nagoya Five"(1963–1964).
He often created works which indicated liberty, antiwar and anti-government in surrealistic ways.
Afternoon of Life
From around 1965 to 1975, he coached the younger generation as an adviser of Chubu Photography Federation of Students.
He also donated his body to science via Nagoya University School of Medicine upon his death and no funeral was held, in accordance with his living will.
Works
Exhibitions
- 1936 Personal Exhibition / Maruzen Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1939 "The Blue Wonder Association Exhibition" / Maruzen Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1948 - 1950 "VIVI" / Maruzen Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1949 "Modern Art" / Mitsukoshi Gallery, Nihonbashi, Japan
- 1949 - 1954 “Bijyutsu Bunka Art Association Exhibition" / Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum etc.
- 1952 "Photographers of Figurative art" / Aoyanagi-Hirokoji-Ten, Nagoya, Japan
- 1953 "Mado(Windows)" / Nagoya, Kobe, Japan
- 1956 - 1961 "Honoo(Flame)" / Konica Gallery(Konica Minolta Plaza), Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya, Japan
- 1956 "International Subjective Photography" / Takashimaya Gallery, Nihonbashi, Japan
- 1956 Personal Exhibition / Matsushima Gallery, Ginza, Japan
- 1956 Personal Exhibition / Maruzen Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1957 Personal Exhibition / Konica Gallery(Konica Minolta Plaza), Fukuoka, Japan
- 1957 - 1976 "VOU Exhibition" / Kunugi Gallery, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan etc.
- 1957 "Modern Art Photography Group" / Kunugi Gallery, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan
- 1958 "ESPACE" / Maruzen Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1958 "Exhibition of Japan Subjective Photography" / Fuji Photo Salon(FUJIFILM Photo Salon), Tokyo, Japan
- 1958 "The Vanguard of Photography and Poetry" / Mimatsu Publishing, Inc. Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
- 1960 "The Sense of Abstraction" / The Museum of Modern Art, New York, U.S.A.
- 1960 "Subjective Photography" / Konica Gallery(Konica Minolta Plaza), Tokyo, Japan
- 1963 "Shusen Kai"
- 1963 - 1964 "Nagoya Five" / Fuji Photo Salon(FUJIFILM Photo Salon), Tokyo, etc.
- 1968 "VERB" / Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
- 1978 - 1982 "The Exhibition of The Committee of The Chubu Headquarter of The All-Japan Association of Photographic Societies" / Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
- 1983 "Pictures of Yamamoto Kansuke" / New French School, Nagoya, Japan
- 1986 "Avant-Garde Photography, Italy and Japan / The Contemporary Art Gallery, Seibu Department Stores, Ikebukuro, Tokyo, Japan
- 1986 "VOU" / Rhode Island School of Design Museum
- 1988 "The Art of Modern Japanese Photography" / Two Houston Center
- 1988 "Surrealist Kansuke Yamamoto Exhibition" / IMAGINATION MARKET Q&P, Ginza, Tokyo, Japan
- 1988 "The 150 years of Fine Art Photography - France, Japan, America" / Tsukashin Hall, Amagasaki, Hyogo, Japan
- 1988 "Fine Art Photography in Japan 1920's - 1940's" / Konica Plaza(Konica Minolta Plaza), Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan
- 1988 "Japanese Photography in 1930s" / The Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura & Hayama, Japan
- 1989 "Avant-Garde Photography of Nagoya" / Nagoya City Art Museum, Japan
- 1990 "The Silent Dialogue : Still Life in the West and Japan" / Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
- 1990 "Surrealism in Japan" / Nagoya City Art Museum, Japan
- 1990 "Modernism in Nagoya 1920's - 1930's" / INAX Gallery, Nagoya, Japan
- 1995 "The Founding and Development of Modern Photography in Japan" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
- 1995 "The Age of Modernism" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
- 1995 "Collage, A Method of Contemporary Art" / Nerima Art Museum, Japan
- 2001 "Modern Photography in Japan 1915-1940" / Ansel Adams Gallery, San Francisco, U.S.A.
- 2001 "YAMAMOTO Kansuke:Conveyor of the Impossible" / Tokyo Station Gallery, Japan
- 2003 "The History of Japanese Photography" / The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston etc.
- 2004 "Provincial Fine Arts" / Nagoya City Art Museum, Aichi, Japan
- 2005 "How Photography changed People's Viewpoints" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
- 2006 "Vintage Photographs 1935-1955" / Stephen Wirtz Gallery, San Francisco, U.S.A.
- 2006 "Curators' Choice from The Collection of Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
- 2006 "Collage and Photomontage" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
- 2006 "The World of Yamamoto Kansuke" / Doshisha University, Tokyo office
- 2007 "Living in the Material World -'Things' in Art of the 20th Century and Beyond" / The National Art Center, Tokyo, Japan
- 2008 "Surrealism and Photography" / Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Japan
Books
- "Batafurai(Butterfly)"(1970) Nagoya Miniature Books Publishing
See also
History of photography/Japanese photographers
List of Japanese photographers
References
External links
Persondata |
Name |
Yamamoto, Kansuke |
Alternative names |
|
Short description |
Photographer and poet |
Date of birth |
30 March 1914 |
Place of birth |
Nagoya, Japan |
Date of death |
2 April 1987 |
Place of death |
|