Photo: Erika Yoshino “Untitled”, 2013, C-print, image size: 20 x 30 cm, paper size: 27.9 x 35.6 cm © Erika Yoshino / Courtesy of Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film.
At the end of the seventeenth century, Marie Anne de La Trémoille, duchess of Bacciano and princess of Neroli, Italy, introduced a new fragrance to the world. Produced from the essence of the bitter orange tree, the perfume was coined “Neroli” after her kingdom.
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Neroli has one of the most intoxicating aroma, both fresh and spicy, sweet and sharp. Those who smell it fall in love, like Japanese photographer Erika Yoshino (b. 1970). A graduate of Tokyo College of Photography in 1994, for the past two decades Yoshino’s photography includes classic black and white street photography, and more recent color work shout in and around Tokyo, drawing viewers in with their distinctive worldview.
Erika Yoshino “NEROLI”, installation view at Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film, Jul 9 – Aug 8, 2016 / Courtesy of Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film / Photo: Kenji Takahashi
To illustrate this, Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film, Tokyo, presents Erika Yoshino: NEROLI, on view now through August 6, 2016. The exhibition, Yoshino’s second solo show with the gallery, is composed of 20 works made between 2011 and 2014.
As Yoshino reveals, “Extracted from flowers of trees over 20 years old immediately after they bloom, Neroli has a complex scent that is a mixture of flower nectar, tree bark, and leaf. When I photograph, I release the shutter of my camera, at times impulsively, focusing on the subjects and also on my own emotions. The image appears on the photographic paper and makes a fleeting moment permanent. Neroli is like a collection of time. In aromatherapy, it colors the air with its distinct scent which evokes the image of a beautiful white bitter orange flower. I would like to capture moments of chance, passion, and ineffable, irreplaceable importance in photographs.”
Photo: Erika Yoshino “Untitled”, 2013, C-print, image size: 20 x 30 cm, paper size: 27.9 x 35.6 cm © Erika Yoshino / Courtesy of Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film
Yoshino’s elegant, eloquent images are sumptuously understated, creating a lush, velvety visual experience that envelops you with a warm and welcoming spirit. Yet, within each photograph are deeper subtleties and nuances, much like the oil of the bitter orange. The work is tender, but not sweet, emotional but not sentimental. There is a complex interplay between the photographer and her subjects, as she captures their deepest essences.
Taken as a whole, NEROLI captures Yoshino’s growth in the medium of color photography, revealing a new mature phase in her work. In addition to the snapshots taken in the northern part of the Kanto region, Yoshino includes a selection of works that capture mirror reflections or re-photographed images to illustrate the surreal multiplicity of the visual world. What is photographed is both real and illusion, inviting us to consider how we perceive fiction in a factual world.
Erika Yoshino “NEROLI”, installation view at Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film, Jul 9 – Aug 8, 2016 / Courtesy of Taka Ishii Gallery Photography / Film / Photo: Kenji Takahashi
The result is one the revels in the pleasure of the senses, in the space between the known and the unknown, much like the perfume itself, captivating us with its bewitching spell.
Miss Rosen is a New York-based writer, curator, and brand strategist. There is nothing she adores so much as photography and books. A small part of her wishes she had a proper library, like in the game of Clue. Then she could blaze and write soliloquies to her in and out of print loves.
