BERLIN.- «Focus Japan» is Only Photography's first exhibition about Japanese Photography this year.

The exhibition starts with an overview of the gallery's collection. Alongside watercoloured Albumines from the 19th century, at that time mainly produced for travellers from the West, the exhibition shows samples from the sixities and seventies, two important decades for Japanese Photography, as well as some works of the younger generation. Among others are: Rinko Kawauchi, Ruji Miyamoto, Ikko Narahara, Koji Onaka, Toshio Shibata und Issei Suda.

Alongside original prints you will also find a large range of Japanese Photography books. Compared to the US and Europe there are still only few galleries and public institutions in Japan that organise photography exhibitions. Therefore photobooks carry special importance for the reception of photography in Japan.

Works, often as a series of photos, are produced from beginning with a photobook in mind. Like film clips photobooks show the manifold facettes of Japanese life. Young photographers in their early thirties like Rinko Kawauchi have already published a dozen of books. Thus they follow the tradition of today worldwide famous old masters like Nobuyoshi Araki, Daido Moriyama or Eikoh Hosoe, who, before their international careers, mostly showed their works in books published by themselves, and thus decisively had contributed to the importance and appreciation of Japanese Photography.