Japanese/Brazilian Photographer Hirosuke Kitamura to Exhibit at 1500 Gallery, curated by Miguel Rio Branco February 1 – April 28, 2012

NEW YORK – 1500 Gallery is pleased to present Hidra, an exhibition of color photographs by the Japanese/Brazilian artist Hirosuke Kitamura, curated by the celebrated Brazilian artist Miguel Rio Branco. Hidra consists of 11 works, including a diptych and a triptych, and will be on view from February 1 – April 28, 2012. There will be a reception for the artist at 1500 Gallery on Wednesday, February 1, 6-8 pm.

The title Hidra is in Brazilian portuguese and refers to the many-headed Lernaean Hydra of Greek mythology. These works were for the most part made in bregas (inexpensive brothels) in Salvador da Bahia (Brazil), where Hirosuke, or “Oske” as he is known, has been making photographs regularly for over ten years.

In the words of Miguel Rio Branco: “Something quietly emerges at every moment throughout these images: ghosts halfway between sex and death; fragments of seduction that wander in-between lost worlds. Sexuality is something transparent, smoky and elusive under our fingertips. But how does one define sexuality in a place where the body is everything – not only material but also consumable? And here sexuality becomes all but ghostly, the way it has always been in Japanese tales: from another world, but yet somwhere here near us. These images supercede the passage of time, reaching beyond notions specific to any particular time or era.

The interesting thing in the creative process – in the artistic process – resides in the reaffirmation of the artist’s individuality. This is increasingly difficult in a world dominated by advertising, publicity and marketing. It is progressively more rare to see true creativity in an artist’s work. Everything is business; nothing is personal. In these [Kitamura’s] images, on the contrary, it’s all personal, lived and felt. Everything is personal. This constitutes an important departure from what we typically see today, where the photographic image is becoming technically more distant from what was photographed.

In art, what counts is the soul and not the theme. Here [in Kitamura’s work] the themes are diluted and mixed. Here we do not get stuck anywhere, nor to a specific moment in time; we move on to another phase. A phase that brings us to another space, another world, a limbo. Here, what appear as skin, fingers, breasts, sexes, and clothes are tranformed into masks, gifts, lights and Bahia sweat by this Japanese artist who one day came to Salvador.”

About Hirosuke Kitamura

A graduate in Literature from the Kyoto University of Foreign Studies, Kitamura came to Brazil in 1990 as an exchange student. In 1993, he studied contemporary processes, painting and drawing at the Museum of Modern Art of Bahia (MAM-BA). In 1995, he did an intensive course in photography, after which he began to work as a freelance photographer. In 1997 he became a correspondent for the Japanese music magazine Latina, providing articles and images on musical events throughout Brazil. Hirosuke’s work is present in the Sao Paulo Museum of Art (MASP). He currently lives in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil.

About Miguel Rio Branco

Miguel da Silva Paranhos do Rio Branco was born in 1946 in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain. Rio Branco is a painter, photographer, filmmaker, and creator of multimedia installations who currently lives and works in Rio de Janeiro. He has worked and exhibited extensively in Europe and the Americas since the beginning of his career in 1964, and is one of the most highly regarded living contemporary artists in Brazil.

In 1966, Rio Branco studied at the New York Institute of Photography and, in 1968, the School of Industrial Design in Rio de Janeiro. Rio Branco began exhibiting paintings and photographs in 1964, and in 1972 he also began making films. He has been a correspondent of Magnum Photos since 1980.

Miguel Rio Branco has works in several important public and private collections, including the following: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Centre George Pompidou (Paris), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam), Museum of Photographic Arts of San Diego, Rio de Janeiro Museum of Modern Art (MAM-RJ), Sao Paulo Museum of Modern Art (MAM-SP), Sao Paulo Museum of Art (MASP), and Inhotim (Brazil).