Kusukazu Uraguchi – Shima no Ama

Kusukazu Uraguchi

Huis Marseille, Museum for Photography will be presenting Kusukazu Uraguchi. Shima no Ama, an exhibition of eighty captivating black and white photographs selected from the monumental archive of this Japanese photographer. From the mid-1950s onwards Kusukazu Uraguchi (1922-1988) devoted thirty years of his life to photographing the ama, an all-female community of Japanese fisherwomen and divers in the Shima region where he was born. His admiring gaze is a powerful testimonial to their ever-dwindling vocation. The exhibition was first shown in 2024 during the international photo festival Les Rencontres d’Arles, and has been augmented in Huis Marseille with additional photographs, a new video compilation, and recently restored vintage wooden panels.

Women of the sea

The ama, Japanese ‘women of the sea’, have populated the coasts of the Shima region for more than three thousand years, free-diving for seaweed and abalone (a marine mollusc regarded as a delicacy). Their unique role in the Japanese imagination, their sensual link with the sea, and their fearlessness and sovereignty have inspired poets and artists for centuries.

Assertive

His photographs depict the ama’s ancient practices, and show their energy at every moment. Inspired by their vitality and the trust they placed in him, he developed an intense and expressive idiom. Black-and-white contrasts, unusual framing, and gestures and actions that show the women’s spontaneity, anchor the ama in their time – between 1960 and 1980 in particular – and simultaneously pay homage to their strong, assertive femininity.