MASAHISA FUKASE
SASUKE
Published by Atelier EXB, 2021
Book size 26 x 19 cm
192 pages
Hardcover
Language French
In 1977, Fukase turned his lenses on his new companion Sasuke. Growing up with felines, he decides with the arrival of this new cat in his life that it would become a photographic subject in his own right, fascinated by this creature full of life named after a legendary ninja. Sasuke disappears after ten days and the photographer sticks hundreds of small posters (as featured on the cover of the book) in his neighborhood. A person brings back his cat, yet it is not Sasuke but never mind he welcomes this new cat with as much affection. One year later, he takes a second cat named Momoe, entering the frame as well and he will never get tired of photographing their games. They become for the Japanese photographer a boundless experimental field leading to an extraordinary body of work in its technical and visual inventiveness.
As often in his work, this series shows a form of projection of the photographer into his subject. The cat, a faithful companion who never leaves him, takes the place of his wife, eternal heartache, later represented by the iconic fleeing crows.
His cats have been the subject of several books in his lifetime and Tomo Kosuga has dug into the photographer's archives to conceive this ultimate book as the achievement of a series of publications devoted to his cats." Publisher's statement
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In 1977, Fukase turned his lens on his new companion: Sasuke. Surrounded by felines since childhood, he decided with the arrival of this new kitten to make him a photographic subject in his own right, fascinated by this lively creature named after a legendary ninja. To his great dismay, Sasuke disappeared after about ten days and the photographer posted a hundred posters of his lost cat (those on the cover of the book) in his neighborhood. A person brought him her cat but it was not Sasuke, no matter, he welcomed her with just as much affection. A year later, he took a second cat, nicknamed Momoe, who would also enter the frame. Fukase would never tire of photographing their games, which would become a real field of limitless visual experimentation. This is indeed, as is often the case in his work, a form of projection of the photographer into his subject. The cat, a faithful companion who never leaves him, takes the place of his wife, eternal heartache, later represented by the emblematic fleeing crows.
His cats were the subject of several books during his lifetime. Tomo Kosuga, director of the Fukase archives, delved back into this corpus of images in order to design this book as the culmination of a series of publications dedicated to his felines.
Editor's writings