Naoyuki Ogino Speaks: Fusing Yin with Yang in Photographs

I now believe in the shades and ambiguities of a truth. I think truth varies in different contexts, like background, education, or personality. Truth is mobile and changes through time. Even if a photograph had captured truth in it, I do not think that an image is capable of conveying the complete truth because it is not a one-way communication; it depends on the viewer too. Rather, I think the photograph connotes vagueness; it is not a verbal language.

Naoyuki Ogino During a Book Signing
COURTESY OF THE PHOTOGRAPHER

Most importantly, I believe that it is very important to acknowledge this zone of vagueness, a zone where the vague/invisible “yin” fuses with the visible “yang.” This is a melting point that I now seek through photography. I paraphrase it as the “cloud” between documentary and art, in which I seek the scents of culture reflecting their lands through the people.

Tell me more about your working process — before and after the “click.”

Most of my works are based on a link from my past; someone whom I met, or something from before…

Consider my working process as a voyage: I am on a ship with a mast (shaved with my subject and energy attracting me), holding a sail (woven from my nature), catching the wind (blown from my surroundings) on the waters (named the Mongoloid’s cultural block) and on my hand I am holding a compass (balancing yin and yang) for seeking the treasures (accumulated with the scents of the cultures). When my ship anchors at a port, I usually find one particular person as a guide to help immerse myself into the culture. Then I will just try to approach the ordinary people, and walk into their immediate living conditions — totally and honestly. This is how I begin shooting, and this is the first half of my photography creation.

Upon returning home, I embark upon my second shooting process: confronting the developed films. Selecting images for the final showcase is like diving alternately into my unconscious and conscious.

TRANSCRIBED FROM SEVERAL DIALOGUES BETWEEN NAOYUKI OGINO AND GRETA AART
ORIGINALLY ARTICULATED IN JAPANESE AND ENGLISH
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