Hideka Tonomura "die of love"

Dates: November 24 (Sat) — December 22 (Sat), 2018

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Zen Foto Gallery is pleased to present Hideka Tonomura’s third solo exhibition “die of love” from November 24 to December 22, following her exhibition “They Called Me Yukari / mama love” in 2013 and “orange elephant” in 2016. Her latest work “die of love” is a love story woven by all the happiness, sadness, difficulties and ridiculousness in life - which can be considered as Tonomura’s own “theatre of love”. A photo book under the same title will be published to accompany the exhibition.

Love has no form

If love has a form,

let it be a photograph in the very end

It’s nothing but paper

Just laugh -

Life itself is ridiculous, afterall

 

Ah, a tragicomedy, it is



ーHideka Tonomura

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Artist Profile

Hideka TONOMURA

Born in 1979, Hideka Tonomura graduated from the Broadcasting and Filmmaking Department of Osaka Visual Arts School and began photography in 2002. She published her first photobook “Mama Love” in 2008 with Akaaka Art Publishing, revealing her deepest pain and her family’s dark, hidden secrets, which made an unforgettable impression on the public. In 2013 she published “They Called Me Yukari” with Zen Foto Gallery, documenting the life and people around her when she worked as a hostess in Kabukicho, Shinjuku. Her other publications include “Orange Elephant” (Zen Foto Gallery, 2015), “cheki” (Morel Books, 2018), “die of love” (Zen Foto Gallery, 2018), “SHINING WOMAN #cancerbeauty” (Zen Foto Gallery, 2020), “mama 恋 love” [New Edition] 
(Zen Foto Gallery, 2021), “Toxic” (Zen Foto Gallery, 2022) and “They Called Me Yukari [New Edition] (Zen Foto Gallery, 2023).

Actively presenting her work in and out of Japan, she participated in the group exhibitions 
“Shikijo: Eroticism in Japanese Photography”, Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong (2016); 
Daiwa Foundation Japan House Gallery, London (2018); “10/10 Celebrating Contemporary Japanese Women Photographers”, Kyotographie, Kyoto (2022), “Love Songs”, La MEP – La Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris (2022), and the Arles International Photography Festival Associate Programme “Transcendence” (2024).

Tonomura launched the “SHINING WOMAN PROJECT” in 2019, a portrait project dedicated to women fighting cancer. In 2022, her debut work “Mama Love” was collected by the MEP – La Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris.

Publications & Prints