Limited-Edition Photograph by Rinko Kawauchi

“ The photographs in Illuminance are personal images, but there are universal things behind the images; that is very important to me.”
—Rinko Kawauchi

The Aperture Foundation is pleased to offer this very special limited-edition photograph by world-renowned Japanese photographer, Rinko Kawauchi. The image is from the Aperture monograph Illuminance, the artist’s first book published outside of her native Japan. This body of previously unpublished photographs showcases Kawauchi’s ability to take ordinary life moments and turn them into extraordinary images. States the artist, “I want imagination in the photographs…a photograph is like a prologue. You wonder, ‘What's going on?’ You feel something is going to happen.” As Kawauchi intended, this image, with its subtle color palette punctuated with iridescent sparks of confetti, incites curiosity in the viewer, making us wonder about what we are looking at and what will happen next.

Rinko Kawauchi (born in Shiga, Japan, 1972) studied graphic design and photography at Seian Junior College of Art and Design. Among her awards and accolades are the 1997 Grand Prix Prize at the Guardian Garden’s 9th Hitotsubo Exhibition, the 27th Ihei Kimura Photography Award in 2002, and the 2009 International Center of Photography Infinity Award in Art. She has had solo exhibitions at Fondation Cartier, Paris; Photographers’ Gallery, London; Galleria Carla Sozzani, Milan; Hasselblad Center, Göteborg, Sweden; and Museum of Modern Art, São Paulo, among other international venues. Recently her work was included in the Brighton Biennial 2010, curated by Martin Parr. Kawauchi lives and works in Tokyo.

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>Exhibition information