Photograph, gelatin silver print on paper
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/kiyohiko-komura-14424" aria-label="More by Kiyohiko Komura" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Kiyohiko Komura</a>
Two Abstract Forms
Presented by Jacqui Brantjes and Daniel Pittack 2010
abstraction
body
emotions, concepts and ideas
figure
formal qualities
from recognisable sources
irregular forms
leg
non-representational
people
photographic
<p>Little is known of the photographer Kiyohiko Komura who was active in Japan in the 1940s, although his work shows a strong modernist influence, and combines an interest in form with an innovative approach to photographic processes. His series of three abstractions was produced by making photographic close-ups of anatomical forms, and in some cases overlaying multiple negatives.</p><p><em>Gallery label, June 2011</em></p>
paper print photograph gelatin silver
18 February 2011 – 15 April 2012
2012-04-15
18 February 2011 – 15 April 2012
2012-04-15
2011-02-18
Tate Modern (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/
2011-02-18
Japanese Photography
Collection based display
14 October 2014 – 10 May 2015
2015-05-10
14 October 2014 – 10 May 2015
2015-05-10
2014-10-14
Tate St Ives (St Ives, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/stives/
2014-10-14
The Modern Lens: International Photography and the Tate Collection
Exhibition
Two Abstract Forms
image: 238 × 238 mm
support: 241 × 241 mm
Presented by Jacqui Brantjes and Daniel Pittack 2010
<div class="text">
<p>This gelatin silver print depicts a pair of bent knees cut off from the legs to which they should be attached, floating against a pale background similar in colour to the skin of the knees. The image was created by underexposing the area surrounding the knees in a manner similar to solarisation. Much of Kiyohiko Komura’s work involved photographing specific parts of the human body and using darkroom techniques to transform these images into abstract formal arrangements of light and shadow.</p>
<p>Born in Nagoya in 1899, Kiyohiko Komura was an amateur photograph and worked for Todai Bank until the great Showa depression of 1929. Camera clubs and magazines for both amateur and professional photographers were cultivated in Nagoya where, in 1936, Shuntaro Narita launched a magazine called <i>Camera Man</i>. It published images taken by photographers associated with the Nagoya and Kansai photography clubs, including pictures by Komura, who was an active member of such clubs, and works by Niryu Nagata and Yoshio Namiki. Renowned Japanese photographer Minayoshi Takada joined the editorial team and the magazine promoted avant-garde photography trends by introducing the work of Yasui Nakaji and Yoshio Shimozato among others. In November 1940, censorship put an end to the magazine.</p>
<p>Komura served in the army during the Second World War but continued to take photographs and make drawings while travelling around Japan and China. After the war Komura resumed his photographic experiments and worked as a photographer documenting Nagoya’s architectural heritage.</p>
<p>Komura’s photographic work has its roots in the modernist movements of the 1930s when many photographers attempted to produce abstract formal compositions from everyday objects and materials by simply manipulating light and shadows in the darkroom. By the late 1940s, and under the influence of other forms of abstract art, photographic work of this kind began to be described as ‘Subjective Photography’. The German photographer Otto Steinert was the most well-known theorist of this type of photography and, although it is not known whether Komura was influenced directly by Steinert or his ideas, the Japanese photographer’s work shares many characteristics with Steinert’s.</p>
<p>
<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>R. Kaneko, N. Matsumoto, D. Klochko, <i>Modern Photography in Japan 1915–1940</i>, Carmel, California 2001.<br/>Anne Tucker (ed.), <i>The History of Japanese Photography</i>, New Haven and London 2003.<br/>
<i>Sashin Ni Kaere, Return to Photography: Japanese Photography of the 1930s</i>, exhibition catalogue, Zen Foto Gallery, Tokyo 2010. </p>
<p>Inès de Bordas<br/>March 2012</p>
</div>

Summary
2012-08-02T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<p>Little is known of the photographer Kiyohiko Komura who was active in Japan in the 1940s, although his work shows a strong modernist influence, and combines an interest in form with an innovative approach to photographic processes. His series of three abstractions was produced by making photographic close-ups of anatomical forms, and in some cases overlaying multiple negatives.</p>

Display caption
2011-06-06T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
abstraction body emotions, concepts and ideas figure formal qualities from recognisable sources irregular forms leg non-representational people photographic