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Nobuyoshi Araki (*1940)
Untitled (Self-portrait), Japan, Tokyo, 1985
Item number 085-02594
The »mame-otoko« (bean man) is a historical element of shunga that first appeared as a stylistic device in the genre in 1712. It is the figure of a small, silent observer who witnesses the erotic scenes in the picture. The bean man is said to be a citizen of Edo (today's Tokyo) who wants to study the sexual life there in detail. To do so, he receives a miracle pill from the god of love that makes him immortal and young, but also shrinks him to the size of a bean. And so he wanders about observing the love life of Japan.
Araki resurrects the motif of the »mame-otoko« in the photographic present by staging himself in his settings - as in this image, in which he deliberately places himself in the corner as a silent observer.
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Gelatin silver print on baryta, print date: 2005
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Image dimensions 32,1 x 40,3 cm (32,1 x 40,3 inch)
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Object dimensions 35,5 x 42,9 cm (35,5 x 42,9 inch)
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Mounting, Framing Mounted in black wooden frame c. 50 x 60 cm (included in the price)
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Condition
Double weight paper, semi-matte surface -
Annotations
Signed by the photographer in pencil on the reverse -
Literature
Nobuyoshi Araki, Araki. Tokyo Lucky Hole, Taschen: Cologne 1997; Nobuyoshi Araki, Self-Life-Death, London: Phaidon 2005, p. 430/31. -
Prints / Japanese Photography / Akt /
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