itodenwa (2 cans + 1 string)

itodenwa (2 cans + 1 string)
Yukari Umekawa

SCAD BFA photography show

May 29 – July 11, 2009
Opening Friday May 29, 7-10 PM


Photographer, Yukari Umekawa’s art emerges from her efforts to find peace in a state of longing and isolation. Born in Osaka, Yukari left her friends and family in Japan to pursue her BFA in photography at Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta. She juxtaposes images of telephone wires and the sky to express a nostalgic homesickness. The telephone wires represent her perpetual desire for contact with home, while images of the sky serve as a comforting reminder that she and her distant home are under the same sky. The exhibition is aptly titled itodenwa, which is the Japanese word for a telephone created from two cans and a string. By deconstructing her digital camera, she created a pinhole camera to capture her images. Through the use of long exposures, her constructed pinhole camera returns dreamlike images that are softened and out of focus. Yukari states, “The photographs then become unclear like my memories.” The show marks her debut, and will be displayed at whitespec alongside Scott Silvey’s exhibition “Civic Remedies”. In contrast to Yukari, the American-born sculptor and painter now resides in Tokyo and is presenting his newest paintings from Japan. Together, the exhibitions will be a unique opportunity to explore the influences of Japanese and American culture on artists living outside their respective homelands.

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