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I'd been working very hard, but one day, everything went totally wrong when I lost my beloved son in a tragic accident.
He was a student at Yale University, studying animal science, with a focus on ornithology. I felt as if everything I was doing
was a total waste, and I spent months in a deep depression. A year before this I'd had a heart attack, and triple bypass
surgery, and wasn't very strong physically. On top of that, two years before, I'd also lost my sister, Mami. I
hated everything and wanted to do nothing. But, one day, all of a sudden something hit me, and I realized that I was
sitting in front of all these pictures—shots of my family, and specially pictures of Kenneth, and also many other pictures
I had taken. I went through all my files, looking at the shots of my son and family along with all the pictures I had
shot for myself over the years.
These images were unlike anything I had shot as a commercial photographer, a businessman,
or an entrepreneur. They had nothing to do with my clients or business—they were not for money. They were
images of my own world, without any direction from outside. For many years I had been carrying a Nikon and a few lenses,
and a Luna Pro wherever I went in the world, shooting my own subjects. These pictures were very natural, with no gimmicks,
really just everyday life and places; just my eye behind the camera. They were my own themes, developed over many years—all
the different ways I had been challenging myself, shots of everyday incidents and variations—sometimes only one shot
I got at a lucky moment! This was my journey as a photographer. It was my own work, images of times which will
never come back—a crystallization of light and object, which summed up a serene world.
Over the years,
I had always intended to have one-man photography shows of my own work, and also somehow to publish a book. But tragically,
these things happened as a result of my son's death—I wanted to create a memorial to him. So I went to work. I had one-man
shows in New York, Tokyo, Kyoto and Germany, and at the same time, published my book, Odyssey.
My
show in NY in Soho took place at the Cast Iron Gallery. At that time, Mitsui Trading Company helped me a lot, and I
owe them great thanks. My eldest daughter, Natasha, worked there before she took a position with ISG, the International
Steel Group in Cleveland, Ohio. Mr. Masayoshi Furuhata, the president of Mitsui, was especially helpful in establishing
the scholarship for the Kenneth Kagetaka Yamaoka Memorial Fund, and he also contributed a wonderful essay for my book.
He helped us both publicly and privately. My show in Tokyo was in the Ginza at the Dentsu Kosan Gallery. For this,
I owe thanks to Shuzo Tanaka, who works at Dentsu as a well-known copywriter. He has been my best friend since we were
together at the Waseda Club for the Study of Design. He rose up through management at Dentsu, and is now retired and
has become an accomplished marathon runner, attending events worldwide. In addition to Shuzo, I owe a lot to my good friends
Ken Nakagawa ( architect at Takenake) Tohru Ono (architect at Taisei) and Keiji Aoki (architect at Fujita).
I
decided to use my photography to create a book to honor my son. All the photos from my shows in Soho and Tokyo were
already scanned by James Du, who at that time worked for Book-of-the-Month Club, and I added a few more. Janet Doyle
took care of the design, editing and publishing details, and I really appreciate everything she did. I also asked a
few people to contribute essays about my work for the book. Samuel Antupit, one of the most respected graphic designers
in NY, made a huge contribution to my book by writing the wonderful introduction. I was very sad to learn of his death
a few years later, but I feel so honored that someone of his caliber really appreciated and understood my work—perhaps
the best of anyone I ever knew. I was so sorry he couldn’t have seen my later shows and I am terribly sorry I
can now never show him my new work.
My next shows took place in Germany, and we got a great deal of help from
our friend Christl Pelikan, who is married to the mayor of Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Gerd Geismann. We were invited to their
wedding 5 years ago, which took place during the Alstadtfest, a medieval festival held there every summer. It was just
like a fairy tale—the whole city celebrated, and it was a wonderful wedding. I met a lot of wonderful people on
this trip, too. I’d like to specially mention Christine Peterson and her mother, Madeline. I admire Christine
very much for her courage and her fighting spirit, and recently, she was a big help to me in translating captions for my pictures
into German. I also became good friends with Michael Weigand, Ramona Bechtos and Chris and Corrie Perez—all as
a result of Christl’s wedding! In Germany, the Sparkasse bank and the local news media gave
me and my book a lot of publicity, and the Bank eventually became my sponsor. I had one man shows at Sulzbach-Rosenberg,
Schwandorf and Neumarkt, in the beautiful historical area of Bavaria. Right now, I'm planning shows in Nuremberg and
some other cities. I was very fortunate to be able to visit this beautiful area, where I got the opportunity to shoot
villages, the countryside and medieval castles. I really appreciate the warm hearts of the German people, and owe special
thanks to Mr. Schlenk, president of the Sparkasse Bank in Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Mr. Aures, coordinator of events of the Sparkasse
Bank, Mr. Stoeckle president of the Sparkasse Bank in Neumarkt, and his assistant, Mr. Meier. I also owe special thanks
to Mr. Loesch, of the Stad-Sulzbach-Rosenberg newspaper
I included many pictures with a Bavarian medieval feeling
in my one-man show in Kyoto, which took place during the beautiful cherry blossom season in April 2005. The Art Life
Mitsuhashi Gallery, located near the Ginkakuji in Kyoto, is owned by my good friend Shinichi Mitsuhashi. I met him
at Art Center when he was sent there by Mitsubishi to study automotive design as a young man. Here I must also mention
his sister, Setsuko Mitsuhashi, a genius painter, who died young from an incurable disease. I first saw her work after
Mr. Mitsuhashi came to Tokyo for my first show—when I delivered the picture he had bought to Kyoto, I had the opportunity
to see her work, and I was so touched by her efforts to fight her disease because of her family, especially on behalf of her
two children. I was lucky to acquire a book of her collected works, edited by the famous Takeshi Umehara. I still open
this book occasionally, and I tell myself each time I should work harder—compared to an artist like that, I’m
not doing enough.
The show in Kyoto turned out to be a very successful show, and it took place thanks to the efforts
and kindness of Dr. Susumu Fujita, to whom I’m very grateful, for helping to make all the arrangements. Dr. Fujita
is my brother-in-law Isao's respected classmate from military school, who now practices gynecology in a hospital in Kyoto.
When I visited Kyoto, on a previous visit to Japan, he arranged for me to photograph a bamboo forest there. Ohara and Kyoto
were areas I'd always wanted to shoot, and I included these pictures in the show. Dr, Fujita was one of my best
supporters, buying many of my pictures. I wish him the best of health for a long time to come. Dr. Ikuta, on staff at
Dr. Fujita’s hospital put lots of effort into an amateur photographic society in the Kansai area, and introduced my
work to them—every day many of the members came to the show, and it was a pleasure to meet them all.
During
the show I was at the gallery from morning to night, and I met so many people. Friends came from all over Japan, and even
from the U.S. and Taiwan, and gave me wonderful feedback on my work.. Here I have to mention Mr. Noritsuna Watanabe,
who came all the way from Taiwan for the opening. He studied with me at Art Center and was a young designer at Toyota
at the time who was sent to Art Center for advanced design training. On the weekends we used to go to watch the Times
Grand Prix at Riverside, the Stardust Grand Prix at Las Vegas, and many other local races. At one of those events, I
shot the Toyota 2000GT which was the first Japanese racing car to compete on the US racing circuit—and I was told it
was also used for the James Bond movie, You Only Live Twice. It carried license plate # TNT-007. What a car! That
shot was the first picture I ever sold in the US! Now Mr. Watanabe has retired and is teaching car design at a university
in Taiwan. I also have to mention his daughter, Junko, who completed a masters degree at Manhattan School of Music at
Columbia University. A soprano, she has already has 3 concerts and I am completely astonished by her voice.
As a result of the show, one of the good friends of Mr. Mitsuhashi who I met was Mr. Tadashi Shimizu, who is a producer
and interviewer for Kyoto Channel TV, who along with Miss Nakajima, interviewed me live for the cultural section of the TV
program. He’s the so-called “don” of the cultural and art world in Kyoto, and he’s now advising
me on my second book, Encounters. I also met Mr. Uesaksa of Tachikichi, head designer and creative director of this
world famous ceramic company. He also came to see my show, and liked my work—and we’ve started working together,
using my photography for promotional purposes for Tachikichi.
Also, my good golf buddy, Miyoko Nagata, who
lives in Hagi, Yamaguchi, had previously taken me to photograph Tokoji and Rurikoji. These pictures, too, were included
in the show, and she, too, came to see the show. While I was preparing everything in New York, I met Hiro and Madoka Ishibashi.
It so happened that Madoka’s father is a commercial photographer, and Madoka e-mailed news of my show to the Japan Photographers
Association. As a result many professional photographers from the Kansai area also attended my show, among them Mr.
Higashiide, photographer of the Miho Museum by I.M. Pei, as well as Ms. Yoko Azuma, the curator of the museum, Ms. Akiko Murakata,
a professor from Kyoto University, and many
others.
. . .
My two daughters graduated from Johns Hopkins
University. After graduation, my youngest daughter Tiffany, worked in New York as an investment banker, and later moved
to Chicago. In 2003 she married Eddie Zimmerman, who now works as an architect in Chicago, Goettsch Partners, and who
previously worked for I.M. Pei Partners in New York. My many trips on behalf of their wedding led me to visit Chicago
many times. I fell in love with downtown Chicago, where I took a lot of pictures in every season—these also
were featured images in the shows. Tiffany now works for US Bank in Chicago, where she is an investment banker, a VP, managing
a division that analyzes bonds.
My oldest daughter Natasha got married in Cleveland in 2004 to Russell Ettinger,
a pilot for Delta Airlines. In 2003, she joined the International Steel Group, in Cleveland Ohio, and I got the assignment
to photograph four steel mills for her company for advertising and publicity. I challenged myself, and luckily, I completed
it successfully. (Some of these interesting shots may even wind up in my next book.) Her company was acquired
by Mittal Steel, and she subsequently left the company. Natasha then decided to go back to school to complete her MBA
at Duke University, Fuqua School of Business. These days, she, too, works for Delta Airlines, as General Manager, Distribution
Strategy.
In August 2006, the International Music Festival was held in Sulzbach-Rosenberg, chaired
by our friend Mrs. Christl Geismann. In conjunction with the performances, I had a one-man show at the festival, which
was attended by many dignitaries from the 7th Army base nearby in Grafenwoerh, including Brigadier General David Perkins and
his wife. Following that, I also had an exhibition at the Sparkasse bank in Nuestadt, for which I owe great thanks to
Mr. Pflaum and Mr. Hallman. Plus, I took pictures for my show to be scheduled in Weiden at the Sparkasse—it was
a very busy summer!
Summer 2007 was even busier! I had three shows in Germany—the first took
place at the end of June, in Neumarkt, once again at the Sparkasse, through the kind arrangements of Mr. Meier, who helped
with my first show there 3 years ago. The second took place in July, in Amberg, a beautful city in Bavaria, at City
Hall. I was so impressed by the wonderful exhibition space, and the opening party was attended by many dignitatries
including the Ambassador. The third took place also in July in Wurz, at the gallery owned by Dr. Rita Keilhorn, in conjunction
with a famous music festival, the Werzer Sommerkonzerte. Then, in February 2008, I had a wonderful show at the Sparkasse in
Weiden, along with Christl, who exhibited her jewelry there at the same time.
Once when Christl was in New York,
she brought my new poster, Rooftops of Bavaria, to the German Consulate, and they became very interested in my work.
As a result, I had a show at German House, the German Consulate, in New York in October 2007, the opening of which was attended
by almost 200 people and was a great success. Through another good friend, I was also introduced to the UN, where I had planned
to have an exhibition in August of 2008, but due to the mishandling by an official in charge of events there, I was unable
to secure the necessary sponsorship in the time frame. But I'm still planning to pursue it for the future. I’m
also continuing to work on my second book, Encounters. I am asking my old friend Anzai Mizumaru, the famous Japanese
illustrator, to create the introduction, and I plan to have the book produced in three languages—English, Japanese,
and German.
All these encounters—not only with the subjects I photographed, but also with the amazing people
I have met along the way, have helped me arrive at where I am today. I appreciate them, one and all!
. . . Memories....are a story of hope, despair, turning point and aspiration. South Salem, NY Michael
K. Yamaoka
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