"I dreamt of flying: Noguchi Rika"
2004-04-24 until 2004-06-05
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art
Tokyo, , JP

The Hara Museum of Contemporary Art is pleased to present a solo exhibition by Noguchi Rika, the first solo showing of the photo-based artist’s works at a museum in the Tokyo Metropolitan area. Since the mid-1990s, after studying photography at Nihon University, Noguchi Rika has been creating and exhibiting throughout Asia, Europe and America. Noguchi captures the essence of her subject matter by the use of unique viewpoints, as evident in her early series To Dive and in later series such as Seeing Birds, A Prime, New Land, Catching Water and Rocket Hill. The artist fills her seemingly simple images with light and air to evoke a sense of purity and serenity.

This exhibit will feature about 40 of the artist’s works, including the early To Dive and new large-format prints up to 100 x 250 cm in size made especially for the exhibit. Her series, Rocket Hill (2001-) was taken at the Tanegashima Space Center and first shown in a solo exhibition at the Marugame Genichiro-Inokuma Museum of Contemporary Art. The present exhibit marks its first appearance at a museum in the Tokyo Metropolitan area. To Dive (1995) shows a diver in both the sea and a training pool, bearing a weight and swimming underwater while Rocket Hill depicts a rocket launch site, a place where we see rockets that are about to escape the Earth’s gravity and fly off into space. Noguchi’s photographs capture the circumstances, places and landscapes of our real lives with a charm that places them outside the category of documentary or reportage.

We live within a sea of multi-media, but it is photography above all that compels us to reconsider the significance of “seeing.” Amidst the image proliferation and IT-driven image consumption of today, Noguchi’s work sends out a fresh message for the twenty-first century.

In June, the artist will hold a solo exhibition at the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham, England.

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for Japan

Other Important Exhibitions in Japan