Mikiko Hara, In the Blink of an Eye – The Eye of Photography

Based on Japanese photographer Mikiko Hara’s recent book Change, this exhibition features twenty of her color photographs spanning over two decades from 1996 to 2009. Hara’s square color snapshots involve no noticeable high drama. Her portraits – men and women, adults, adolescents, and children are often alone hovering in the bay of everydayness: a schoolgirl at a train platform, mother and daughter asleep in a subway car, a middle-aged woman sternly looking off-camera. Although these scenes were shot in Tokyo and its suburbs, the settings and activities have an ambiguous quality, the images evoke emotion and mood through nuanced facial expressions and body language. Hara’s landscapes and still-lifes complement her portraits in an even more nonchalant style. They reflect the artist’s practice of accumulating fleeting moments in daily life.