
Shikawatari
Shiraishi Chieko
Negative Gallery
English and Korean
Softcover
16 pages
2024
“Shikawatari” (“Deer Crossing”) is Chieko Shiraishi’s long-awaited new work, released five years after her photobook “Shimakage”. In this black-and-white work, Shiraishi presents a series of poetic images taken in wintry Dōtō in Eastern Hokkaido. The central theme is a herd of deer that Shiraishi encountered while travelling; the shy animals wander the snowy landscapes, across frozen lakes and barren forests. Shiraishi keeps her distance to the animals. In some photos, they let her come near, but they always keep a watchful eye on her. She encounters other animals as well – large birds, foxes – and wide, clear landscape shots give us a sense of the surroundings. Shiraishi’s series masterfully creates a sense of wonder, as if one is at the doors to a world of magic realism, as if the deer have decided to permit us access to an otherwise secret part of the natural world.
(Source: https://ftp.shashasha.co/en/book/shikawatari)
About the Artist
Chieko Shiraishi was born in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. She studied photography and darkroom techniques at a workshop given in Funabashi-shi, Chiba Prefecture, by Katsuhito Nakazato and Kazuo Kitai. Since 1998, she has presented some twenty solo exhibitions, in Japan, Italy, and in France. She also participated in the Tbilsi Photo Festival in 2016. Her work is held in the permanent collections of the Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts and the Ashikaga Museum of Art.
(Source: https://mindseye.fr/artists/chieko-shiraishi/)
About the Publisher
Negative Gallery is a publisher based in Busan, South Korea.