街頭攝影 street photography 街頭攝影：鈴木達夫鏡頭中的日本街頭

Tatsuo Suzuki is one of the last great masters of Japanese urban photography. Within this field, as a personal project, he specializes in portraits of people he happens to encounter in the city. His work of lights and contrasts in black and white, the daring pursuit of emotion in people, and the capture of the most unique moments of chance, have led him to become a current reference in this type of art. He began photographing seriously in 2008 with a Nikon D70 camera. It all started when he captured a candid image on the streets of Enoshima, a small island south of Tokyo. Tatsuo Suzuki was born in 1965 in Tokyo. For over 25 years, he dedicated his life to working as a salaryman in a company, whose activity was in no way related to photography. However, his love for this art knew no bounds, and one day he decided to leave his company behind, and dedicate himself wholeheartedly to what truly fulfilled him. Currently, he has a part-time job, that helps him cover the obvious financial needs that his passion for photography demands. He is also the founder and leader of the urban photography collective, known as Void Tokyo, the most acclaimed and respected in the current landscape of Japanese street photography. Tatsuo Suzuki began in this craft in a self-taught manner and essentially learned to photograph while taking pictures. The influence of Moriyama is undeniable, but Suzuki's claustrophobic framing and his focus on physiognomy sometimes recall iconic street photographers like Bruce Gilden. He also cites Robert Frank and Jack Davison as his main photographic influences. Street photography, put simply, pays attention to everyday life situations and the urban landscape in which they unfold. This means that people are very important within this type of photography. Suzuki believes that through this style, it's the best way to extract from people their truest expression and to truly understand what they're made of. It's something he realized after his first year as a photographer, and that's why he was always seeking this truth we speak of. Now, however, he tries to seek a photograph that is more in line with his own emotional state at the moment. This is something he hopes will continue to be the case and become his way of life and personal contribution to photography. As a young person, he sang and played guitar in a punk rock band, and in one way or another, he has wanted his love for music to also be reflected in his work as a photographer. He believes that the attitude of his photography is heavily inspired by the tension and strong emotions of musical genres like punk. Regarding his working method, he considers it truly important to shoot a lot and continuously. In his view, shooting a lot is how you familiarize yourself with the cityscape and discover the things that are interesting. He believes it would be very difficult for him to capture the photos he wants if he didn't work in this way. Tatsuo Suzuki's photographs depict a transgressive and raw portrayal of Tokyo's hectic pace of life. Tension, stress, worry, and other sensations are reflected in the eyes of many of his subjects. Tatsuo Suzuki mentions that often photography depends on your mood, and he, regardless of how he feels emotionally, goes out to photograph. Sometimes he's simply tired and seeking peace and rest. So, he takes advantage of that moment to shoot and see how it translates into his photography. He believes it's his way of expressing his feelings most directly in photography. When he takes these kinds of photos, it's like photographing himself. Regarding the people he captures in his images, he mentions that sometimes it's a simple spontaneous photograph, other times it's an accidental photograph, and most of the time, they are just people he happens to cross paths with once in life. So far, he hasn't experienced his relationship with these people he photographs on the street turning into a friendship. Tatsuo Suzuki has received numerous awards and recognitions and has exhibited internationally on several occasions, including at Photo Shanghai in 2015 and in London in 2016. In 2020, his book Friction, Tokyo Streets, an extensive collection of his street photographs, was published by Steido. Currently, he lives in Yokohama, on the outskirts of the Japanese capital, where he continues to capture the haunting intensity of the city in those same monochromatic tones that his eminent predecessors considered so poignant. His captivating work conveys his unique artistic sensibility and is a testament to the profound potential of black and white photography. If you enjoyed this video, please remember to like it, share it with your friends, and subscribe to my channel. This way, you'll always stay up to date with all the videos I produce here. Until the next one. See you later.