Photographer

The theme of this work is“yokan,” one of the Japanese traditional sweets, made from red been paste, sugar and agar powder.  An essay by Jun-ichiro Tanizaki about yokan became the trigger for my interest in yokan. He writes about yokan in the context that Japanese foods are influenced by subtle light in a Japanese old house, as below;

　　 “The cloudy trancelucence, like that of jade; the faint, dreamlike glow that suffuses it, as if it had drunk into its very depths the light of sun; the complexity and profundity of the colorーnothing of the sort is to be found in Western candies. How simple and insignificant cream-filled chocolates seem by comparision. And when yokan is served in a lacquer dish within whose dark recesses its color is scarecely distinguishable, then it is certainly an object for meditation. You take its cool, smooth substance into your mouth, and it is as if the very darkness of the room were melting on your tongue; even undistinguished yokan can then take on a mysteriously intriguing flavor.”( Jun-ichiro Tanizaki  In Praise of Shadow, Translated by Thomas J. Harper and Edward G. Seidensticker, Tuttle Publishing )

I was fascinated by Japanese old houses and photographed them. At some point, the rectangular shape and texture of yokan remided me of the deep darkness in the Japanese architecture.  When I realized it, I put yokan in front of my camera.