Shinkichi Tajiri (, /ref> Los Angeles, December 7, 1923 –
Baarlo
Baarlo (; ) is a village in southeastern Netherlands. It is located in the municipality of Peel en Maas, Limburg, about 6 km southwest of Venlo.
Name and symbols
The oldest mention of the name Baarlo is from 1219.
The oldest certifica ...
, Netherlands, March 15, 2009) was an American sculptor who resided in the Netherlands from 1956 onwards. He was also active in
painting
Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...
,
photography
Photography is the visual arts, art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is empl ...
and
cinematography
Cinematography () is the art of motion picture (and more recently, electronic video camera) photography.
Cinematographers use a lens (optics), lens to focus reflected light from objects into a real image that is transferred to some image sen ...
.
Childhood and education
A
Japanese American
are Americans of Japanese ancestry. Japanese Americans were among the three largest Asian Americans, Asian American ethnic communities during the 20th century; but, according to the 2000 United States census, 2000 census, they have declined in ...
, Tajiri was born in
Watts
Watts is plural for ''watt'', the unit of power.
Watts may also refer to:
People
*Watts (surname), a list of people with the surname Watts
Fictional characters
*Albie Watts, a fictional character in the British soap opera ''EastEnders''
*Angie ...
, a working-class neighborhood of Los Angeles. He was the fifth of seven children born to Ryukichi Tajiri and Fuyo Kikuta, first generation emigrants (
issei
are Japanese immigrants to countries in North America and South America. The term is used mostly by ethnic Japanese. are born in Japan; their children born in the new country are (, "two", plus , "generation"); and their grandchildren are ...
), who moved from Japan to the United States in 1906 and 1913.
In 1936, the family relocated to
San Diego
San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...
. His father died when he was fifteen. In 1940, Tajiri received his first lessons in sculpture from Donal Hord.
Life and work
In 1942, following the signing of
Executive Order 9066
Executive Order 9066 was a President of the United States, United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by United States president Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942. "This order authorized the fo ...
, Tajiri's family was incarcerated at
Poston War Relocation Center
The Poston Internment Camp, located in Yuma County (now in La Paz County) in southwestern Arizona, was the largest (in terms of area) of the 10 American concentration camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II.
The sit ...
in Arizona. Tajiri was a soldier, with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, like his brother Vincent. They fought in Europe, from 1943 on and he was wounded in Italy. Shinkichi went back to Chicago to study at the Art Institute from 1946 to 1948.
In 1949 he went to Paris to study with
Ossip Zadkine
Ossip Alexeevich Zadkine (; 28 January 1888 – 25 November 1967) was a Russian and French artist of the School of Paris. He is best known as a sculptor, but also produced paintings and lithographs.
Early years and education
Zadkine was born o ...
and then
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger (; February 4, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was a French painting, painter, sculpture, sculptor, and film director, filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism (known as "tubism") which he gradually ...
. He met
Karel Appel
Christiaan Karel Appel (; 25 April 1921 – 3 May 2006) was a Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet. He started painting at the age of fourteen and studied at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam in the 1940s. He was one of the founders of the avant-gard ...
COBRA
COBRA or Cobra, often stylized as CoBrA, was a European avant-garde art group active from 1948 to 1951. The name was coined in 1948 by Christian Dotremont from the initials of the members' home countries' capital cities: Copenhagen (Co), Brussels ...
exhibition at the
Stedelijk Museum
The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
, Amsterdam. In 1951 he went to Germany and taught at the
Werkkunstschule
A Kunstgewerbeschule (English: ''School of Arts and Crafts'' or S''chool of Applied Arts'') was a type of vocational arts school that existed in German-speaking countries from the mid-19th century. The term Werkkunstschule was also used for the ...
Wuppertal. In 1955 he won a
Golden Palm
The (; ) is the highest prize awarded to the director of the Best Feature Film of the Official Competition at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the festival's organizing committee. Previously, from 1939 to 1954, the festiv ...
at Cannes, for his first short film, ''
The Vipers
The Vipers were an Irish new wave group of the late 1970s. A live act fronted by Paul Boyle and guitarist George Sweeney, they toured with Thin Lizzy, The Clash and The Jam.
The group was formed as part of a growing punk scene in Dublin the ...
'', because of his experimental use of the language of film. From 1956 he lived in the Netherlands, since 1962 in Baarlo. He worked as a sculptor and painter. He exhibited at the famous Kassel
documenta
Documenta (often stylized documenta) is an Art exhibition, exhibition of contemporary art which takes place every five years in Kassel, Germany.
Documenta was founded by artist, teacher and curator Arnold Bode in 1955 as part of the Bundesgarte ...
II, 1959; III, 1964 and IV, 1968. From 1969 Tajiri Shinkichi taught at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste at Berlin. 1969 and 1970 Shinkichi took pictures of every part of the
Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall (, ) was a guarded concrete Separation barrier, barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and the East Germany, German Democratic Republic (GDR; East Germany). Construction of the B ...
. In 1970 he went to Denmark and directed the award-winning documentary ''Bodil Joensen – en sommerdag juli 1970'' about Bodil Joensen. In 1975 and 1976 he recreated the
Daguerreotype
Daguerreotype was the first publicly available photography, photographic process, widely used during the 1840s and 1850s. "Daguerreotype" also refers to an image created through this process.
Invented by Louis Daguerre and introduced worldwid ...
: surreal portraits, nudes and daguerreotypes of the Wall.
Catalogues
* ''Spiegel mit Erinnerungen, Shiunkichi Tajiris Wiederentdeckung der Daguerreotypie''. Exhibition, catalogue, Künstlerhaus Bethanien: Berlin, editor, 1977
* ''Stereoscopic Views by Tajiri'', Exhibition, catalogue, Stedelijk Museum: Amsterdam, editor, 1979
Notes
References
* Jörg Kirchbaum, ''Lexikon der Fotografen'', Frankfurt am Main: Fischer TB, 1981, p. 183.
* Claudia Bulk, "Tajiri, Shinkichi," in: Reinhold Mißelbeck, ed., ''Prestel- Lexikon der Fotografen: Von den Anfängen 1839 bis zur Gegenwart'', Munich: Prestel, 2002, p. 235.