right there, like intersections on a go board, and take photos of people working on the street and in restaurants. When someone caught my eye, I would talk to them, decide on the camera angle, and set up the lighting. I absolutely loved the amazing feeling of turning the streets of Manhattan or the Brooklyn ghetto into a studio for only a few minutes. I kept on taking these environmental portraits that contain a wide scope of the subject’s surroundings and before long I felt that this would be my forte. During those days spent building up the foundations
of my art, the feeling of fun was stronger than the pain of financial hardship.
Yet, it’s a fact that the meaning, the prospects, of me, a Japanese person, continuing to take photos in New York gradually diminished. That’s what I was feeling before I came back to Japan. I then started sketching the outlines of my goals: to one day have a collection of photos taken in Japan on the shelves of Dashwood Books, a bookstore in Manhattan devoted entirely to photography, and to become one of Japan’s top portrait photographers, one who would be asked to shoot for the New York Times.
Kei Tani’s “Gatcho-n” sparked heart-pounding anticipation about photography projects I could only take on in Japan. But soon afterward I heard news of Tani’s death. I was deeply
saddened by no longer being able to photograph him and that strengthened my desire to record comedic art on film.
(excerpt from the introduction by Shoda Masahiro)