Ryosuke Toyama: Leading Light

In 2008, having not taken over my family's kimono dyeing business, I set out on a journey to photograph artisans of my generation who were in similar circumstances. I was motivated by my own complex. I asked them to write a letter to themselves 10 years from now to express their determination in the world of crafts. I told them to seal the letter after writing it and left the place. Later, I took their portraits with a camera in front of them, asking them to recall the contents of their letters. I could see the hesitation as well as the determination in his eyes. I kept the letter and promised to come back in 10 years to photograph them again. I met and photographed 20 craftsmen as I traveled around the country. I named this work "Seed.” For the next 10 years, I kept thinking about how I would face them the next time. In 2018, with the letter that I had been entrusted with in hand, I took a photo of the letter in my hand, which I was able to take with a 50x60cm camera. I built myself a huge camera and went to photograph them using the ambrotype, a technique that was developed just before the industrialization of photography. The exposure time was one to three minutes. During that time, by having them imagine the past, present, and future of their own work, the layers of time were burned into the glass. I named this work “Sprout.”