On January 27, 1945, Soviet troops liberated the Nazi concentration and death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland. Today is also the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust. Below the poem Todesfuge (Death Fugue) by Paul Celan. A photographer and good friend of mine, Koen, told me about this poem while we were discussing Heavens… I had never heard of it… and I thought it fitting for this day today. — Paul Celan – Todesfuge Schwarze Milch der Frühe wir trinken sie abends wir trinken sie... Read the Rest →
Meet my late grandfather, Antoine Libens. Alfons Libens & Jeanne Degros were his parents. But everyone called him Gaston. Gaston is the reason that I ‘m starting my next long term project: Heavens. Heavens will become a personal journey, me trying to make sense of something unimaginable. Something unspeakable. Something that took place in Europe 60 years ago, before I was born. I feel the need to personally understand and place the huge and unimaginable injustice done to so many millions during the years of the Holocaust. A darkest page... Read the Rest →
Today is exactly 1000 days ago that BURN Magazine published my first image of YAKUZA... and what an adventure that was to become. I must say I had no clue.
Surprise! For those of you who ordered the second edition of YAKUZA, I present you with the new cover image. I hope you like it… The inside of this second edition is the same as the sold out limited edition… but the last image, binding, chapter paper and cover are different. Read more about that here. Exciting… In about ten days the second edition will be stitched and bound, the cover attached, and all the books will be individually shrinkwrapped, ready to be packed and shipped. And so the distribution... Read the Rest →
So we made it. A tremendous collaborative effort led by super talented Diego Orlando, we created, printed and published our second book over at BURN Magazine, and we named it “BURN.02″. Almost two hundred pages of pure blood, sweat, tears & pride… with much original and commissioned work, never seen elsewhere. I’m tremendously proud of the stunning work in there, and the fact that David Alan Harvey was able to pull it off yet again. And again, also this book is literally flying out the door… We printed a limited... Read the Rest →
These past two months have been great. Humbling also. More than anything else, I’m incredibly grateful for all the attention YAKUZA gets everywhere… Many good things have happened and I’m hoping many more good things will come. And it started all on BURN magazine with David Alan Harvey as my mentor… I literally owe you everything, amigo. I’ve literally received more than a thousand emails after the limited edition sold out, asking if there were plans for a second (general) edition of ODO YAKUZA TOKYO. At the time, I’ve always... Read the Rest →
I never thought it would go this way. I expected to sell about half of what I printed, ever. Instead, the book ODO YAKUZA TOKYO opened on BURN on June 17, and now, 34 days later, the 500 copy limited edition is sold out… If you have any enquiries about this edition, just send me a direct email. Today I’m wrapping the final book to ship. It does feel kind of sentimental. Completely honored, and grateful to the chance I’ve been given, I now need a rest. Just a... Read the Rest →
Finally…. it’s here! The book…. Over on BURN Magazine there’s a great interview by David Alan Harvey with me about the new book… and obviously you can buy it there. Please do so… it’s a beautiful object… and limited to only 500 numbered copies… Below an excerpt from the introductory text: In the hotel bar in Niigata, I’m only slowly starting to understand the extremely subtle social interaction that is continuously happening; the micro-expressions on the faces, the gestures, the voices and intonations, the body language… As the bar... Read the Rest →
So here are the first details of the book ODO YAKUZA TOKYO to see the light of day. I promised some insight into how I went about all this, and here it is. Although the finished product will look “easier” than the magazine layout, actually a lot more work went into this one… Thinking about creating a good “package” was crucial. That package meaning everything from images to paper to size to aspect ratio to typography, binding, number of pages, all had to match up perfectly. To get started,... Read the Rest →
This is Taka-san in the mirror creating calligraphy for the ODO YAKUZA TOKYO book (more info on the book soon). He is our fixer for the entire Yakuza project, and over the years has become a dear friend. His work will be featured as chapter pages in the book. There will be 12 works in total. He’s not a professional artist, but his calligraphy has a very strong personality speaking through it. It’s a very emotional and exhausting process for him to put his sentiments about the Yakuza story into... Read the Rest →
Recently, the incredibly friendly and professional people at GEO Epoche magazine in Germany contacted me to supply images for their new issue about the history of organized crime throughout the world. Specifically, they wanted to use my images to complement their 18 page chapter about the history of the Yakuza in Japan from 1945 to 2010… of course I gladly obliged. This special issue #48 hits the stands today April 13, 2011. The editors at GEO Epoche are an absolute joy to work with. Super professional, an incredible eye to... Read the Rest →
In Tokyo now photographing cherry blossoms… For some reason, the past 3 years, somehow, in my ever infinite wisdom, I’ve always managed to miss this huge event. But not this year. This is going to be the closing image of what I think is the first major step in the Yakuza project: the photo book “ODO YAKUZA TOKYO”. Why cherry blossoms? Well, that’s another one of the many enigmas surrounding the Yakuza: “ODO” or 桜道, is literally translated as “the way of the cherry blossom”, and is the credo of... Read the Rest →
On the last night, Soichiro calls us to meet. He tells us some guys are going out, and that they are OK with us tagging along. On the way over, he explains to me that the club his friend owns, has a slight twist… Instead of a guest giving dollar bills to a dancer during a show, it works the other way around: the dancer chooses to collect dollar bills from a guest she chooses. — In this club, guests pay a fixed amount for a table and a fixed... Read the Rest →
So I’ve started working on the second issue of 893 Magazine (more about the first issue here). A bit of a delay compared to what I had hoped, but some (good) unexpected things did come up that warranted this… Not in the least winning the Blurb Photography Book Now prize for Editorial… and some other ultra mega cool things that I’ll hopefully be able to tell about very soon. But I’ve started. No turning back. And no matter how excited I am to share new stories and images, the beginning... Read the Rest →
I thought this was worth a mention: for an interview about my 893-Yakuza project, which will appear in the forthcoming January issue of Fotografie, a Dutch photography magazine, The Editor-in-Chief Diana Bokje (@dianabokje) does something special… not only does she print an interview which captures our various conversations very well, but she also reproduces 5 complete spreads directly out of 893 Magazine Issue#1, including original layout and texts. Simply amazing that someone not only recognizes but also acts upon the the link between images, layout, typography and writing in the... Read the Rest →
Members of other families arriving at the funeral of Miyamoto-san (one of the family bosses) to pay their respects. Miyamoto-san died in february 2010, as a result of a stroke.
So we made it. A tremendous collaborative effort between David Alan Harvey, Diego Orlando, Anna-Maria Barry-Jester, all the photographers featured, and yours truly. We created, printed and published our first book over at BURN Magazine, and we named our baby “BURN.01″. Three hundred pages of pure blood, sweat, tears & pride… I’m tremendously proud of the stunning work by all the photographers in there, and the fact that we were able to pull it off. The book is literally flying out the door… We printed a first edition of a... Read the Rest →
This is Soichiro driving me through the streets of Shinjuku, Tokyo, in his third generation 1989 Nissan Skyline GT-R. It’s all white and retro as hell and yes, even though I’m not a car freak, I must admit it’s very cool. I like retro. Click on the image to see a short video of me trying to capture the moment. I never even knew he bought the car, and on the last night that I was there two weeks ago, while my brother and I were walking in Kabukicho debriefing... Read the Rest →
A few months ago, I entered Blurb Photography Book Now without any expectations… And suddenly, 2 weeks ago, I got a call from Eileen from Blurb. At that time I was in Japan for the YAKUZA project, right in the middle of photographing a covert training camp for young recruits. When I explained my potentially slightly precarious situation to her, she understood why I wasn’t able to jump up and scream “Yeah!”…. …but we had a great whispery conversation after that :-) Needless to say, I feel incredibly honored to... Read the Rest →
