Tokyo Time Machine Revisited
Saturday, June 29th, 2013
Sometimes I return to where I had photographed before. It may be for the challenge of finding something interesting in a place I have often visited. This time I wanted to see how much the area had deteriorated since I had last photographed along the wall.
My first visit to the small industrial island that lays in the river between Kasai and Urayasu was for a multi sensory project for DONT Magazine six years ago. It has been one of the most expressive experiences with a web based magazine. I was interviewed, and DONT mashed up the interview and put it with a slide show of the images.
I have passed near the island for years, and I have kept wondering what has happened to those crumbling images. Today in the bright and shinning sun I decided to go over and check them out.
Some of the images had complete crumbled into nothingness. Some were still there but struggling to adhere to the wall. While I was taking the pics an elderly guard man with a grill of missing teeth came over to me and asked me what I was doing. I told him plainly, “I am taking pictures.” “Of what?” I pointed at the pictures on the wall and just shrugged his shoulders like I was a completely crazed foreigner for wanting to take pictures of a wall. He then told me it was dangerous and I shouldn’t be doing any crazy business.
I finished up my pictures and left.
Sometimes I need to return to somewhere I have been in order to know where I need to go. Lives change, cameras are swapped out, and my vision as an artist continues to grow.