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imomus
Made in Japan is an essay by Gary McLeod (a student at Camberwell School of Art currently living in Tokyo) on the TAB site which poses an outrageously provocative question: are digital photographs inherently Japanese? McLeod thinks they are, and while his arguments are somewhat ridiculous, I do think his modest proposal leads us into a fascinating parallel world.
McLeod starts off with something Donald Keene wrote in 1971: "It seems safe to say that the aesthetic ideals which have formed Japanese taste over the centuries will find their outlet in media yet undiscovered and maintain their distinctive existence."Now, that's a fairly straightforward idea. It simply says that Japanese national distinctiveness is not confined to the past, but will keep expressing itself via new technologies. Applied to digital photography, Keene's idea could be expressed: "Digital photography in Japan is, and will continue to be, distinctively Japanese." Nothing too shocking there.
But McLeod takes this much, much further when he suggests that digital photography, as a technology, integrates specifically Japanese aesthetics. Therefore, digital photography wherever it is practiced worldwide is inherently Japanese.
Now, that's a radical idea. It means that whenever you take a photograph with your digital camera, you're making, in some sense, a Japanese image, whether you're in Japan or not, and whether or not you've been influenced by Japanese aesthetics and are consciously thinking about Japanese ways of seeing. There's something in the mechanism itself which leads to -- excuse the pun -- Japan-eyes-ation. What this "something" is, McLeod tells us in the least convincing part of his thesis, is two Japanese sensibilities, yûgen (a kind of strategic nebulousness or vague essentialism) and aware (the sigh-ness of things, perishability). McLeod admits that Sony got the CCD (Charge Coupled Device) technology which underlies digital photography from AT&T Bell Labs in the 1970s, but then attempts to say that this appropriation itself is characteristically Japanese (a logic which conveniently but confusingly makes everything non-Japanese Japanese!), and then tells us that CCD arrays have yûgen because there's a gap or flattening between the curves seen in the real world and the stepped straight lines of digital representation, and have aware because (and this really takes the biscuit!) your hard disk might crash and you might lose your snaps.
Now, this argument is, to say the very least, unconvincing. But the parallel world it opens up is very interesting. I think, for a start, that the world in which we're Japanizing (or Japan-eyes-ing) when we use our digital cameras is no more ridiculous than the world in which we're assumed to be Westernizing (or Western-eyes-ing) when we use modern technology. And although most of us would dismiss McLeod's thesis about the imagery from digital cameras being inherently Japanese, we all too often give a free pass to cultural commentary which suggests, for instance, that Chinese who drive cars are somehow more "Westernized" than Chinese who ride around in rickshaws, even when the cars involved aren't Western ones.In other words, McLeod's nihonjinron argument flushes out, usefully, a series of Westernjinron assumptions that often fly below the bullshit radar. Modernization and Westernization are not, as we never tire of saying here at Click Opera, the same thing. The West's avant garde has often resembled the East's antiquity, our periodic "modern" rediscoveries of our mojo-libido (in the 1920s and 1970s, for instance) are frequently outstripped by Asian versions, and even our modern plumbing achievements have been leapfrogged!
What I do find quite persuasive is looking at my own formation in the West through the eyes of McLeod's thesis. I'm a media man, profoundly influenced by the ways electronic media mediate our experiences. Just about all the music I've listened to has come to me via Japanese-made devices, from the Sony "cigar box" radio I heard the kabuki-clad (and Kansai Yamamoto-styled) David Bowie singing on in the early 70s through the National Panasonic music centre which pumped out postpunk later in the decade to the Sony CD player I bought in 1990. When I came to make music -- and long before I made music specifically for the Japanese market -- I used almost exclusively Japanese technology. Kawai and Roland and Technics synths, for instance. My flirtations with motorbikes and cameras were also mostly Japanese-themed: the cameras I lusted after were, in the chemical age, Pentax, Nikon and Olympus models. In the digital age they've been mostly Fujis. I have lived in an age dominated by Japanese electronic goods (in all areas except computers, where I've bought American). The idea that there might have been something inherently Japanese in the music I made with Japanese synths, for instance, doesn't strike me as too outlandish. After all, even if McLeod's arguments about CCD arrays and mono-no-aware are ultimately unconvincing, I do find a lot of truth in McLuhan's idea that the medium is the message.
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(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 10:21 am (UTC)I don't for one second think that many people believe that art and fashion are one a one way trip down the chronoban. In the macro-political scheme, it seems hardly worth mentioning that something in an art-type field is similar to or based on another, older thing.
Now if only Japan could be inspired by 1990's Japan like the rest of us.
Nate
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 10:29 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 10:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 10:36 am (UTC)Alex P.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 10:49 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:37 am (UTC)Warning: it's a trick question.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:46 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 02:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 02:56 pm (UTC)I think the photograph presentation does affect the subject (this photos features a distracting car hatch, random windows, disjointed colours and lines in the background, bland composition and general flat lighting/contrast) so I'd probably not pay much attention to her as she deserved.
Which reminds me, the other day I witnessed the presence of a most stylish Japanese senior. His clothes were perfect mixture of old school French gentleman with traditional Japanese style garments. I wish I had a camera on me at the time. Better to have a flat picture than no picture at all.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 03:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 01:50 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:01 am (UTC)When I look at a Taiko, I think "this is Japanese" because it has been culturally established as a Japanese invention and is used predominantly by the Japanese. When I look at technology like computers, synths, mobile phones, personal stereos; I don't see a particular dominant culture it's associated with because these inventions are part of the global age.
If anything, practically all "modern" things are associated with the west, fairly or unfairly. Japan wouldn't be the modern powerhouse today if it hadn't westernised. China is slowly becoming more powerful because it's becoming more and more Capitalistic in its approach. Modernity is in today's society associated with the west.
I believe as the world becomes more globalised and international, and cultural lines become more blurred, you'll see "indigenous culture" become little more than a caricature of what it used to be when it was isolated from the world. It'll be much like when amusement parks try to create "themes" around their rides. This is something we see in Japan, even today. I believe the real future is a future free of isolated nationalist identity.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:13 am (UTC)It's the "unfairly" bit that interests me, because I think this assumption has long ago been overtaken by events, and I don't hear enough people trying to decouple modernity from the West.
I also see a contradiction in your position -- you seem very pro-globalist, yet reluctant to decouple globalism from regional affiliations (in this case, with the western hemisphere). You can't have it both ways.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:39 am (UTC)But in future I will say that there is a Long March towards modernity!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:50 am (UTC)Of course, if all you mean by "modern" is technological advance, then it's different.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 12:05 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 02:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 02:00 am (UTC)March towards modernity!
Date: 2008-04-23 04:48 pm (UTC)disgrace or indignities.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:35 am (UTC)The west still dominates modern culture, but it's hardly the heart and core of modernity. Only the most reductive of thinkers take the "West = Modern" meme at face value. I'm not gonna sit here and repeat the same old cliches about globalisation such as "I can buy sushi in Tesco's now, it's just as popular as the sandwiches apparently", it's more complicated than those examples.
Just because I believe we will become more globalised in our identities doesn't mean I'm pro-globalisation in every sense. It's a complex issue. I still believe in politics being regional and having relevance to local people. I can be a Londoner, an Englishman, a Briton, A European and a member of the world. I don't see how these automatically conflict.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:44 am (UTC)And the follow-up question: would being Japanese (assuming you could achieve it in some way) make you more modern than being British?
I think I'd personally answer that: No, I can never be Japanese. But if I could, yes, I would be more modern than I am as a British person. That's tied up with my first -- and abiding -- impression of Tokyo as a city which has embraced modernity more wholeheartedly than London seems to have done.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 12:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 12:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 02:13 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 05:08 pm (UTC)Depends on your definition of Japanese. I could officially become a citizen of Japan if I wanted to emigrate, and I could assimilate to the extreme by leaving behind every aspect of my Britishness (which wouldnt even be that objectionable to me) but I would always be the green-eyed English gaikokujin to the people there... I can't escape that in Japan.
Japan isn't like Britain. In Britain, if you assimilate into the native culture totally, the vast majority of people will accept you as British. It's when foreigners start wearing foreign traditional dress and worship foreign gods and speak foreign languages that some of the British start to notice (and fear) "otherness".
In Japan, If you're not part of the Yamatos or the Ryukyuans, you will always be on the "outside", even if you assimulate totally. Even the Ainu, which are native to Japan, have an otherness about them in Japan. "Pure blood" is a much bigger concept to the Japanese I believe, where as in Britain we just want people to be secular/softcore religious, speak English, and watch footy on the weekend down at the pub to be "one of us".
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 02:12 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 12:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-24 07:06 pm (UTC)i kind of put this wrong it's not about being 'mistaken for' but about being treated as a normal (ie. japanese) person.
that mask doesn't really refer to non-yamato damashi people living in japan but rather to the semi-mythical , type that is known to possibly have taught english in the now defunct english schools or done 'bussiness with the japanese' during the bubble etc in the day then hang out in areas like roppongi at night. etc
if you looked in donki or wherever this picture was taken you'll see that it's part of a huge taxonomical range with types and subtypes none of them either more or less offensive than this one.
tokyo is actually quite a melting pot and fundamentally speaking can compare with london - large communities from the ex-colonies etc on one end, then the fear of the savage continental (east european/ gipsy etc ) on the other
(no subject)
Date: 2009-11-07 02:05 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 11:08 am (UTC)pics speak louder ...
Date: 2008-04-23 02:35 pm (UTC)Re: pics speak louder ...
Date: 2008-04-23 02:43 pm (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willard_Boyle
meanings exist beyond
Date: 2008-04-23 02:50 pm (UTC)in there world wide products is bordering on a whiter shade of pale.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 02:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 03:38 pm (UTC)Unless your music is only important because you use Japanese synths? McLuhan's ideas were formed before the luxury brand culture of the 80s - where we DO judge a book by it's cover. Which is fine but not when it is greater value than the content.
Technology to me feels neither Western nor Eastern. Brands create cultural differences. The only response to your idea would be Buddist koan Mu!
"For example, it's stated over and over again that computer circuits exhibit only two states, a voltage for "one" and a voltage for "zero". That's silly!
Any computer-electronics technician knows otherwise. Try to find a voltage representing one or zero when the power is off! The circuits are in a mu-state."
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 03:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 04:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 04:14 pm (UTC)Thank you for taking the time to read through and write about my discussion paper "Made in Japan". Your thoughts regarding what the west still considers to be "westernization" are useful and I sense, even support the notion that the occidental/oriental relationship is still very much alive. Globalization ultimately finds it difficult to flush away the relationship between this person and that person's "other". Is it always about "us" and "them"?
With regards to my theory, and this has been a common response, there is a tendency for people to overreact to it. It is interesting how in suggesting something is one thing, the first thing people tend to do is immediately say that it isn't that. Such a reaction is just, if there was malicious intent in the appropriation of CCDs etc, but I don't believe that there was. I'm not convinced that Japanese culture is naturally invasive, although many people in Europe and America would argue that plants such as Japanese Knottweed (Itadori) are.
I'm also not saying that every picture someone takes is completely Japanese, but rather some part of it is Japanese, even if only 1%. Obviously, how Japanese a picture is depends on the photographer's ability to infuse their perspective into their image (an act easier said than done) but I feel the whole approach would differ little to, say, a european printmaker using Japanese paper to compliment and suport his printed images. An artist should always be considerate of the materials they use and its in this respect, where I am drawing attention to the Japanese aesthetics that can be viewed in the technology of digital photography.
In a sense, I am suggesting that anyone has the potential to become an artist (or look through artist's eyes) through consideration of their medium, and given how common these digital cameras are, is it unfair to prompt people in the direction of a set of aesthetics that they might not have previously thought about? Although, admittedly, such a theory might never reach the audience it is intended for.
I have heard a lot of "so, my TV could be spanish because it was made there?" or "is my starbucks mug therefore Korean?" and as was recently pointed out to me, perhaps whilst sitting on my ikea chair, my writing is being influenced by swedish culture? Arguably, this is true, but the chair or the mug aren't so synonymous with a process of looking, or overlooked, as is the case with digital photography, and that is ultimately what prompted me to write the paper in the first place.
Regards
Gary McLeod
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 04:29 pm (UTC)I think every technology has an etiquette built in -- an etiquette or a habitus or a set of assumptions about how and why it's going to be used. This etiquette is designed in (for instance, the red light on the front of a video camera that politely informs people they're being recorded -- what is that but an etiquette?) but also elaborated in the Manual.
And now I'm trying to imagine (it could be a nice art project) a digital camera manual with some added chapters on Japanese aesthetics, in all the languages of the world. Things like "try to make parallel lines remain parallel rather than converge as they travel into the distance" and "shoot scenes looking down from a 45 degree elevation" and "denote important figures in your photograph by showing a small golden cloud floating above them".
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 04:43 pm (UTC)Gary
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 05:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-23 05:13 pm (UTC)^this is called "lol.png"
(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-25 02:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-04-25 07:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-05-21 09:17 am (UTC)