MICROMODERN MEMORIES
Fragments from Koganecho ⟫
photo installation
Micromodern Memories - fragments from Koganecho
Polaroid photo installation with artificial flowers, Sullivan Galleries, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
This work was made in relation to the district of Koganecho where I kept a studio space. Koganecho is an arts area located in the city of Yokohama, within the Greater Tokyo Area. It stretches along one side of the Ooka River, lying beneath the overhead Keikyu Line railway tracks. Since the difficult times in the wake of World War II until its shut-down in 2005, it was known as an infamous red-light district. With its streets lined by many women of different ethnic backgrounds who populated the tiny showrooms and brothels within the long chain of its lightly constructed tenement buildings.
These photo stills were shot with an instant Fuji polaroid camera. They were taken one quiet morning, its silence only intermittently broken by the heavy whirring of passing trains. Glimpses of new renovations are mixed with abandoned, decrepit, and former facades. The artificial flowers and vase in front stand in memory of the area’s past and the women who once frequented the spaces; all within the context of an area undergoing yearly growth and change.