Tokujin Yoshioka is a Japanese designer who has received numerous international awards, and many of his works are part of the permanent collections of the world’s most prestigious museums such as the MOMA in New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
An artist, a designer who certainly needs no introduction, capable of overturning reality with his work. After designing the torch for the next Olympics in Tokyo 2020, he always returns to the Japanese capital with “Prismatic cloud“, a work created in 2017 but which continues to travel the world.
An installation with over 10,000 prism poles, forming a giant light sculpture on display at GINZA SIX, a luxury shopping complex located in Tokyo. Using small transparent nails hanging from the roof and stacked together in a structure designed to resemble a real cloud. “Prismatic cloud” is clearly suspended at a height of fifteen meters and where thousands of prismatic poles are located in a space of about 400 square meters. This causes a lot of light to penetrate between the transparent layers of the cloud.
Beyond his cloud, designer Tokujin Yoshioka has created works inspired by nature for other cities, including a tornado, a sculpture made with more than 2 million straws. He has also recently collaborated with the famous French luxury brand Louis Vuitton, for whom he created a vase.
An extraordinary designer, capable of subverting all points of view.
The scent of the sea, the beaches crowded in summer and deserted in winter. This is the essence of the photography of Mònica Figueras, a young Spanish photographer we have already talked about here before.
Mònica was born in Palamós, a small and beautiful town on the Costa Brava, one of those classic villages that fill up with people in summer and empty completely in winter, becoming almost unrecognizable.
This double personality of the place where she lived until she moved to Barcelona and her love for the sea are tangible things in her photographs. Looking at her images one breathes nostalgia for the summer, but also the calm and tranquility of empty beaches that lose the warm colors typical of the summer months and are covered with a less saturated filter.
Since the places and subjects that Mònica Figueras photographs have always been part of her life, browsing through her shots is like entering her personal diary. We look at what she looked at, we are surrounded by what was around her when she was shooting.
After a while, her style started to interest several clients, so for her commissioned work she prefers digital photography, while for her personal projects she often opts for analog, which allows her to obtain better textures and colors without having to retouch the image afterward.
Below is a selection of her images, to find out more go to her website, Instagram and Tumblr profile.
It only took us a few seconds on his Instagram profile to fall in love with João Marques‘ shots, a photographer from Lisbon.
If we had to find a word to describe his photographs, it is contemplation, linked both to the subjects he takes and to the spectators. In fact, many of his images depict figures seen from behind with their eyes pointing towards the sky, at night, during the day, at sunset, full of stars or illuminated by the city lights. Like them, we too are completely enchanted by his work.
We asked João Marques a few questions and he told us how his passion for photography was born.
Tell us how you approached the photograph. Is there a particular moment that you remember?
It started when I was around 13, at that time I asked my dad to try out his digital camera, it was an Olympus and it was pretty cool to me. I started taking mostly portraits of my friends and it kinda was something that always sticked with me through the school years. I was living in a really small town and photography turned into my hobby, I was always filming and photographing my friends. When I was 17 I moved to Lisbon to finish high school and in the following year, I went to film school. In those 3 years, I focused mainly on cinema, I was watching a lot of movies and pretty much discovering my passion for cinema. Only in 2018 after finishing my degree and directing my first short-film ‘Incomum’ I stopped for a moment and thought it could be a cool idea to get some more serious knowledge on photography since it was part of my life for so long but never consciously. I went to Ar.Co and did a 1-year course and that’s when I started to do it again, and I just kept going.
What does photography mean to you and what do you try to tell through your shots?
I work most of the time by instinct, so there’s not that much of a reflection behind my work. At this point, something I understood about myself is that I have a need to create and express myself artistically in some form. I love that photography gave me this opportunity to produce instantly, create an idea or express my perception of a feeling on an image. For someone like me who already has a background also in the film world, where everything is much more complex and involves a lot of people, photography gives me the chance to make almost like a mood board to how I want my films to look and feel like.
What equipment do you use to shoot? Which tools do you take with you when you shoot and why?
I shoot both analog and digital. My digital camera is a Sony A7 III and my film camera is Pentax K1000. It’s funny because actually I’ve never had other film cameras yet (besides point and shoot ones). I’ve been thinking about moving to a 120mm camera but for now still sticking with this one. I don’t like to do very much planning, so I guess most of the time I don’t take anything else besides the camera. If I take something it would be a small light or some prop that I would like to use on the shot.
Is there a shot you are closest to? Can you tell us about it?
If I had to choose one image, maybe this one. This image was taken around 2 am on January 1, 2019. This was the day where I started this series that I titled ‘the sky is a painting’ of night shots. This one represents all the other similar night images that I’ve done. I’ve always felt connected to night time and the sky. I used to stare a lot at the sky and have one of those moments of realizing how small we are. I like to play with this idea of the human vs universe. I would like to do in the future a photo book with all my night atmospheric shots.
Are there artists you follow or are you inspired by?
Sure. There are some other photographers I follow through social media that I find inspiring, mostly I think what attracts me is a personal point of view of the world and life. Some artists I highly recommend taking a look are Mia Novakova, Maya Beano, Tristan Hollingsworth and Edie Sunday for example. However, I think what I’m mostly inspired by is movies. Some filmmakers that have inspired me are David Lynch, Jonas Mekas, Teresa Villaverde, Wong Kar-Wai, and Robert Bresson.
InstHunt – The 10 best photos on Instagram this week
Photography
InstHunt – The 10 best photos on Instagram this week
InstHunt – The 10 best photos on Instagram this week
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Erotic Photography, Leonardo Glauso’s latest book
Sensual and passionate, as beautiful as the girls they portray and in black and white, are the shots of Leonardo Glauso collected in his latest book “Erotic Photography“.
Leonardo was born and in 1989 in Florence, a city that after all his travels and transfers saw him return. In fact, after working in Milan and in the most important European cities he now lives and works in his hometown. After graduating in Graphic Design he decided to dedicate himself entirely to photography, continuing his studies at the International School of Photography in Florence.
Over time he specialized in artistic and fashion nude photography and today he has several collaborations with national and international names such as GQ, Icon EL PAÍS, Schön! Magazine and many others.
His latest book, Erotic Photography, is focused on artistic nudes and comes after five other noteworthy publications such as Naked Girls, Private Nudes, Model Casting, Women in Film and Nude Book.
Erotic Photography is a collection of shots all strictly in black and white that reveal the covers of the protagonist girls as if they were marble sculptures. The play of light and shadow, which sometimes reveals and sometimes hides, emphasizes the lines and shapes of the models, the only real element of the photographs. No disturbing elements, no-frills, nothing distracts us from the sensual, pure and intimate beauty of the bodies.
You can buy Erotic Photography at this link if you are curious to find out more about Leonardo Glauso go visit his site.
