Output details

Chasing Good Fortune, photographic series

This output consists of images taken in Japan from April to May 2010. I travelled between cities that were affected by World War II, as well as to ancient locations in remote western Japan, examining the shifting symbolism of the cherry blossom. While initially associated with Buddhist concepts of renewal, the celebration of life and good fortune, the cherry blossom was re-appropriated during Japan’s 19th-century militarization and colonial expansion. Once celebrated as a healthy and abundant flower, the falling of the petals from the tree became the symbol of Kamikaze soldiers. I develop this investigation of life and death symbolism in my exploration of trees planted before the war in unaffected remote areas, contrasting them with trees in Hiroshima that were planted in nuclear soil.

I made use of digital cameras that allowed for images to be taken under extreme light conditions, further questioning the ability of photography as a medium to convey a singular truth or story. Presenting documentation of what is assumed to be an exact location, my digital process allows for the absolute light and color veracity of these landscapes to be questioned and by extension the viewer’s interpretation of this location’s history. Chasing Good Fortune offers imagery that conveys past and present without a specified linear narrative. My aim is to provide a meditation on the dialectics of life and death that are symbolically embedded in my photographic process as well as in the life cycle of the cherry blossom.