Sakiko Nomura. Tender is the night

Sakiko Nomura (1967) is one of the most outstanding Japanese photographers of her generation. She worked for 20 years as an assistant to Nobuyoshi Araki and since 1993 has exhibited regularly in Japan and other Asian countries, as well as in Europe and Mexico. This exhibition is her first major retrospective.

The black and white male nudes, barely illuminated or sometimes silhouetted against nocturnal and shadowy atmospheres, are the best-known pieces in her body of work. The subjects are young and attractive, like the protagonists of Tender Is the Night, the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald that is explicitly referenced in the title, as power and erotic tension in these images are wrapped in an air of tenderness and certain mystery. These portraits (a real challenge to certain taboos and traditional stereotypes in Japanese culture) alternate in the exhibition with images of animals, still lifes, urban landscapes, atmospheric phenomena, lights and shifting reflections, creating a series of fragmented narratives with a cinematic quality, rich with allegorical meanings about the fleetingness of existence.

The exhibition also devotes special attention to her photobooks, which constitute a significant part of her career.

Curator: Enrique Juncosa