Daido Moriyama: Encounters
The Print Sales Gallery at The Photographers’ Gallery will be showing a gentler side of the iconic Japanese photographer Daido Moriyama’s work this Spring. Following 2023’s major retrospective at The Photographers’ Gallery, which offered an in-depth exploration into his groundbreaking career, Daido Moriyama: Encounters takes a more intimate approach. Focusing on a smaller selection of photographs, this selling exhibition highlights the quieter, more reflective moments of Moriyama’s work.
- Daido Moriyama, Untitled, from ‘Ango’, 2017
- Daido Moriyama, Untitled, from K, 2027
- Daido Moriyama, Untitled, from A Hunter, 1972
“It may look like I’m just pointing the camera at what’s in front of me. But I’m trying to photograph what people see, but don’t notice - something that’s mysterious and unknown in everyday life.”
Born in Osaka, Japan, in 1938, Daido Moriyama’s celebrated career has been shaped by constant reinvention and experimentation. Over six decades, he has become renowned for his bold are, bure, boke aesthetic – grainy, blurry and out-of-focus images that defy photographic convention. A pivotal figure in the radical Provoke movement of the late 1960s, Moriyama redefined photography, unbound by traditional constraints, capturing fragments of reality that "cannot be expressed in language as it is."
Moriyama is best known for recording the freneticism and anonymity of life in the city, Encounters reveals his lesser-explored ability to show beauty and stillness in the everyday. Softly lit city streets rendered in grainy texture evoke a surreal and poetic visual language that embraces imperfection. Fleeting moments of calm and intimacy paired with whimsical glimpses of animals and delicate vignettes of nature – blossoms, snowflakes and quiet, weathered corners of urban sprawl – reveal an unexpected tenderness amongst his usual raw and gritty aesthetic.
This selling exhibition marks the Print Sales Gallery’s new representation of Daido Moriyama. All prints on show and from Moriyama’s archive are available to buy, in a range of sizes. Prices start at £1,200 + VAT. All profits from Print Sales support The Photographers’ Gallery’s public programme.
The Photographers’ Gallery is a registered charity no. 262548.