Katrin Paul, Tokyo, Japan

Booklyn is proud to premiere this vivid trilogy in the Americas.

Tokyo Trilogy
Edition of 5, Tokyo 2004 with slipcase holding the three below books.

Slipcase Cover made from red linen.
W 28.6 cm H29.4 cm D 5 cm
W 11.26 inches H 11.42 inches D 1.97

Recently acquired by the New York Public Library

skindeep, 1998, 37 pages, edition of 8.
74 Photographs copied on color copy paper. Japanese binding.
Letterpress printed in English by zinc-clichèes on gray board with red foil.
W 20.5 cm H28 cm D1.5 cm
W 8.07 inches H 11.2 inches D 0.59 inches

skindeep focuses on the Japanese representation of women in advertising, print-media, and Manga (Japanese comics and graphic novels). I am especially interested in conventional concepts of beauty, as well as their connection to the role of women in the family unit, and the modification of this role from one generation to the next. I have "quoted" these representations by photographing them from print and/or as they appear in their public locations. I combined these images with my photographs of "real" women and places. One important aspect of this juxtapositioning is the resulting connection to Western stereotypes of Japanese women - either as sex symbols or as symbols of tradition. Another result is the frequent impossibility of distinguishing between the quoted image and the real portrait, showing the subjects’ tendency to emulate the "public" ideal of beauty, or the dream world of Manga.

Playing Summer, 1999, 146 pages, edition of 8.
146 Photographs copied on color copy paper. Japanese binding.
Letterpress printed in English by zinc-clichèes on gray board with red foil.
W 20.5 cm H28.5 cm D2 cm
W 8.07 inches H 11.26 inches D 0.79 inches

For the work Playing Summer I photographed ganguro girls celebrating their youth and the last summer of the century in a very playful way. Ganguro, which translates to "dark face", is a short-lived phenomenon that started in Tokyo in late 1998, had its peak in the summer of 1999, and disappeared again soon after the beginning of 2000. The ganguros are an "anti-cute" embodiment of ultimate narcissism. These girls tan their skin; they wear high-heeled shoes to lengthen their legs, have colored contact lenses, and bleach their hair, denying any physical characteristics that are supposed to be typically Japanese. They also have been called yamamba, "mountain witch", a figure from traditional Japanese fairytales due to their garish make up. In stumbling pairs or groups, the ganguro girls hang out at Shibuya. Their colors of preference: pink, baby-blue and silver.

The work Playing Summer uses a "double-take" technique: two similar images taken shortly after each other and juxtaposed on one double-page spread. At first glance they appear to be the same. But the small shift in perspective creates an illusion of movement as well as an element of surprise—equally startling as the ganguros themselves.

Even at 88..., 32 pages, 200, 32 pages, edition of 8.
94 Photographs copied on color copy paper.
Letterpress printed in Japanese by zinc-clichèes on gray board with silver foil Handwriten Haiku by Ms. Shioya.
W 28 cm H19 cm D 0.8 cm
W 11.2 inches H 7.52 inches D 0.31 inches

This work is a portrait of Japanese women who are aged over 70 years. A generation that grew up with a different appreciation of womanhood, in which the woman subordinates herself to her family and suppresses her own urges.
Several portraits will be arranged to on sequence. By showing them that way a slight movement should be suggested like in very slow film-like sequences.

Resume

City of Origin, Frankfurt am Main, Germany

Education
2001·2004 Doctoral Program Tama Art University, awarded doctorate Ph.D.
1997·2001 Master Program Tama Art University, awarded M.A.
1997 Diploma Media-Art, Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe
1992 Diploma Photo-Design, Fachhochschule Dortmund.

Exhibitions
2004 KEOPS Project / The Flanders Center Photographic Gallery, Osaka (S)
International Art Book Fair, Seoul, Korea (G·C)
Tama Art Museum, Tokyo (G·C)
2003 Wanakio, Okinawa (G)
2002 Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama Portside Gallery, (S·C)
Wanakio, Okinawa (G)
10-Jahres-Ausstellung HfG Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe (G·C)
2001 Best 12, Contemporary Art Factory, Tokyo (G)
FIELDWORKS, Contemporary Art Factory, Tokyo (G)
2000 Gallery Shimada, Tokyo (S)
Fuji Photo Salon, Tokyo, Osaka (S)
Gallery Ohm, Munich (S)
Nikon Salon, Tokyo (S)
Gallery Space 21, Tokyo (S)
1999 LIGHT WORKS, Yokohama (S)
Murata & friends, Berlin (S)
Commutation, Yokohama Civic Gallery, Yokohama (G·C)
1998 Art Festival in Tsurugi, Tsurugi (G)
Yamagata Landscape Art Festival, Shinjo (G)
1996 Begegnungen mit dem Fremden, Reiss-Museum der Stadt Mannheim,
Mannheim (G)
1995 Multimediale 4, Karlsruhe (G·C)
Gallery Canolfan, Nagoya (S)
Art Festival in Tsurugi, Tsurugi (G)
Ausstellungsraum c/o Raile, Karlsruhe (S)
1994 Widerstand – heute?!, Galerie Villa Merckel, Esslingen (G·C)
Stellwerk, Design-zentrum Nordrhein-Westfalen Essen (G·C)
1993 Dauerbrand, Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe (G·C)
Focus Museum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Dortmund (G)
1992 Zeche Zollverein, Essen (G)
1989 The Other Photography, Gerrit-Rietveldt Academy, Amsterdam (G)
Focus Museum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Dortmund (G).
(S) Solo (G) Group (C) Catalogue

Awards·Scholarships
2000·04 Monbukagkusho Scholarship Tokyo
2000 New Face Price, Fuji Photo Salon, Tokyo.
Juna 21, New Face Price, Nikon Salon, Tokyo
1997·99 DAAD-Scholarship Tokyo
1998 Yamagata Public Art Grant, Landscape Art Festival, Shinjo
1996 Award for Art and Media Technologies, ZKM, Karlsruhe
1994 Grand Prize, Student Exhibition, Nagoya U. of Art and Design, Nagoya.

This page is maintained by Marshall Weber.