Collection Online as of January 29, 2023
Hall of Thirty-three Bays
Hiroshi Sugimoto
(Japanese, 1948-)
Gelatin silver print
Gift of Mr. Donald F. Barney, Jr., in memory of Helen Greene (Mrs. A. Dean) Perry 1998.116
Location
not on view
Description
During the summer of 1995, Sugimoto created a remarkable group of 48 images at the great Buddhist temple Sanjusangen-do (Hall of Thirty-Three Bays), Kyoto. This 390-foot-long wood building, containing 33 bays, shelters 1,001 almost identical, life-size standing statues of Bodhisattva Kannon. They are placed in rows and grouped around a central monumental figure of the same divinity. These imposing sculptures were carved and gilded by more than 70 artists during the 1100s and 1200s. In this exquisite print Sugimoto recorded the intricate and serene figures as they catch and reflect the early morning sun. His claustrophobic composition is dense with detail, pattern, and cultural and historical references. Standing on a ladder to achieve the low aerial view, he produced an endless array of identical heads with radiating haloes rhythmically receding into space. Here he beautifully presented his long-held interest in photographically depicting infinity and eternity.
Hiroshi Sugimoto
Hiroshi Sugimoto Japanese, 1948-
The photographs of Hiroshi Sugimoto explore the connections between modern and ancient worlds. His early interior views of unpeopled cinemas, aglow with the eerie light of a projected film, suggest modern-day shrines. With similar intentions, he began to photograph in museums, particularly exhibits that featured life-size taxidermy animals and wax human figures.
Since 1977 Sugimoto has traveled the world to photograph barren seascapes. These subjects, which have become his hallmark, are shown with subtle variations in time of day, horizon line, and weather conditions, achieving from a distance the effect of a color-field painting by encouraging viewers to lose themselves in the haze. The black-and-white format, however, is a continual reminder of both the actuality of the subject and its perilous environmental state.
As a child, Sugimoto (born in Tokyo) took up photography with a fervor. He graduated from Saint Paul's University, Tokyo (B.A., 1970), leaving Japan for the United States to study at the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles (B.F.A., 1972). In 1974 he moved to New York City, opening an antiques business before launching full-time into freelance photography.
In addition to a one-person exhibition at the Cleveland Museum of Art (1989), Sugimoto has shown his work at the Palais des Beaux Arts, Charlerol, Belgium (1993), the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (1993, and tour), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (1995). His awards include a New York Creative Artists Public Service Grant (1977) and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (1980) and the National Endowment for the Arts (1982). Sugimoto lives in New York and Tokyo. A.W.