ISLAMABAD: A photography exhibition titled ‘Tohoku - Through the Eyes of Japanese Photographers’ was inaugurated by Japanese Ambassador Takashi Kurai on Wednesday.

The exhibition consists of 123 photographs curated by Kotaro Iizawa, a leading photography critic in Japan It was hosted by the Japan Foundation, in collaboration with the Embassy of Japan and the Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA).

Tohoku is a region located on the northeastern part of the Honshu island where, the ambassador said, the worst damage from the 9.0 magnitude earthquake that hit Japan in March 2011 was concentrated.

“However, this exhibition does not attempt to document the damage, destruction or recovery of Tohoku. Instead it aims to depict how the Tohoku region developed prior to the earthquake and how culture and heritage had been handed down, protected and nourished in Tohoku despite the natural disasters and hardships it has suffered. The exhibition aims to show the natural and cultural environment of the Tohoku region and its people,” he said.

Also on display were photographs by amateur Pakistani photographers who submitted pictures inspired by Japan as part of the Click Japan project.

Ono Kaori, a Japanese amateur photographer, also shared her photographs of Pakistan. She said took the photographs in Lahore, where she lived for two years learning Urdu.

“I moved to Islamabad a year ago and now I teach Japanese in Numl. Of the pictures I have taken, they are like my children so I can’t tell you which is my favourite photograph; but of the city, my favourite places were in the old city of Lahore.”

Explaining the assorted selection, Ambassador Kurai said: “We thought it would be nice to see Pakistani photographers’ perceptions of Japan, as well as a Japanese photographer’s perception of Pakistan.”

PNCA Director General Jamal Shah thanked the embassy for bringing the exhibition to Pakistan.

He said: “The Japanese embassy and the PNCA have been collaborating on arranging various events for many years and the purpose has always been to familiarise the Pakistani audience with the culture of Japan. Art and culture have great power and it is a continuous evolutionary process that brings progress and unites people with aesthetics.”

One of the amateur photographers, Qaiser Humayun, said he visited remote parts of Japan while pursuing a masters degree at the University of Tsukuba in 2013.

“Each of the places I visited in Japan has its own story, I tried to capture these stories in some of my photographs which illustrate their beauty.

The sugar mill situated in the parks of Okinawa prefecture has resemblance with our culture of Punjab. And the eye catching view of the small village near Mount Fuji turned me into a statue for a while as I tried to absorb what I saw. I was constantly forced to ask myself whether the place was real or if I was walking through a mountainous part of paradise.”

The exhibition will continue for a month, as part of a series of cultural events the Japanese embassy has organised to commemorate the 65th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Japan and Pakistan.

Published in Dawn, November 9th, 2017