”The Face” シリーズ７枚は、写真家B.T.Kim氏が2019年6月に韓国Seoul市のGrimson Gallery で発表した作品の一部です。
当時、展示会を訪問し、写真家に直接インタビューした記事も掲載済みですので、ご覧ください。
このシリーズは、当時、既に２５年間ものケニアでの写真家としての活動を蓄積していた写真家が、野生動物や大自然を被写体としていたころから、更に踏み込んで、ケニアに生活する言葉、習慣、衣装が少しづつ違っている40を超える部族で、ナイ ロビに住み、写真家の友人でもあるケニア人の外部の全てをはぎ取り、生身の「顔」を被写体とすることで、「顔」に表れる喜怒哀楽だけでなく、今なお苦しめられている「差別」や「偏見」や「偏り」の実像を捕え、その苦悩の根底にある「貧困」や「病苦」や数世紀にわたった「奴隷狩り」の恐怖を刻んでいる心の実像を描こうとしたものです。
写真家は、世界中の人々にこの写真を見て、考えてもらいたいのです。
The seven photos in the “The Face” series are part of the works that photographer B.T.Kim presented at Grimson Gallery in Seoul, Korea in June 2019.
Please see the article where I visited the exhibition and interviewed the photographer at that time.
In this series, the photographer, who had already accumulated 25 years of photography experience in Kenya at the time, went further than his time focusing on wild animals and nature, and took a step further to capture the real faces of Kenyans who live in Nairobi and are friends of the photographer, from over 40 tribes living in Kenya with slightly different languages, customs, and costumes.
By stripping them of their external appearance, he attempted to capture not only the joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness expressed on the faces, but also the real images of the “discrimination”, “prejudice”, and “bias” that people still suffer from, and to depict the real images of their hearts that are engraved with the “poverty”, “suffering from diseases”, and the fear of “slave hunting” that has lasted for centuries, which are at the root of their suffering.
The photographer wants the whole world to see this photo and think about it.
