project concept and art direction    Hikari Kesho
photographer and rigger   Hikari Kesho
casting    Eva Turetta  Simona Carrara  Stefania Pulli
backstage photography    Mauro Mazzonetto
backstage video   Andrea Bomben
set design assistants   Mirko Sammarco  Giulia Gulli  Marina Turetta
assistant to the photographic set and scenography Mauro Mazzonetto  Stefano Lisi  Vinicio Goffo
video editing   Hikari Kesho
graphic project Hikari Kesho and Carola Ruffato
Eexecution graphic project   Carola Ruffato
Text   Hikari Kesho
translations  Thomas Dewis

INTRODUCTION

About 25 years ago, while talking to a model friend of mine, who was my muse at the time, I told her about a Japanese film in which I had seen geishas tied up with red silk ribbons and she said: “Ah yes, it’s Shibari…”. This word turned a light bulb on in my mind, it was like a sort of illumination! From that very moment I began a spasmodic search for everything related to this spectacular art and I tried to learn it and apply it to my photographic research on the female body, which had already been affected by Fetish influences with some hint of the world of BDSM. A few years later, during one of these searches for images to get inspiration from, I came across some drawings that literally struck me. They looked like old prints representing women, probably geishas, with sensual bodies almost completely adorned with spectacular tattoos, depicted in situations of submission, punishment, humiliation… they were the works of the artist Ozuma Kaname*. The emotional impact was very strong: colours, compositions and situations represented, stimulated me creatively, leading me to take ideas for my photographic research on the theme of Shibari. My intention was not to create photos for which I had only taken inspiration, perhaps for the position of the model as I had done in previous years, but to try to reproduce Ozuma’s paintings as faithfully as possible. It was a great challenge, I would say a titanic undertaking, which involved many good collaborators, without whose help this undertaking would have been impossible! Reproducing in the Italy of 2019 settings that resemble the Japan of the beginning of the century, looking for environments, objects for scenography and appropriate costumes, was not easy. Reproducing then in reality, with real bodies, really tied up and represented in certain situations, what had been previously created with a drawing, has challenged my skills as a rigger and photographer, but especially the professionalism and availability of the models who have endured positions, situations and bindings far from comfortable. Some bindings defied the law of gravity, did not take into account barycentres, were rather uncomfortable and not even particularly correct or aesthetic compared to what we know how to do today with ropes… but the aim was to copy as faithfully as possible the works of Ozuma Kaname! I hope I succeeded… as Manzoni said: “To posterity the arduous judgment”!