24 images following Japanese artist Henguchi while walking through Konohana, 2014.
»Walking was always the first choice for us to get to know and explore a new city. In the beginning, however, walking itself was not a conceptual part of the photographic works we created. Walking became an important / main focusin our collaborative artistic practice in Osaka – more precisely in Konohana – about 10 years ago.
Konohana is a district in Osaka, quite central, near the harbour. It is a very local area, the community consists of old people, families, workers, fishermen, and some foreigners working at Universal City amusement park. (update: since 2025 more and more tourists are staying in Konohana because of the EXPO nearby.)
Since around 2006 or 2007 artists, musicians and young architects started moving into Konohana. The artist Henguchi is one of them, a central influential person, who introduced us to Konohana. He is also one important influence for us regarding
Walking as an art form – as an artistic practice.
In Konohana we also met the British sociologist Iza Kavedžija who wrote about artists in Osaka.
When asked to reflect on their own creative practice, they would frequently invoke images of movement. […] they would emphasise the importance of moving one’s body – and they compare their own lives to a path, albeit one with a
far less visible endpoint“
It takes time to experience a district, and through Henguchi we understood that you can’t just point out anything interesting on a map and just talk a bit about it. The time it takes to go from one place to another, the smell, the atmosphere, – sometimes even the boredom – let the experience stick in your memory, and makes it easier to understand.
Walking is also very helpful if you don’t speak the same language. It’s a different kind of language in which you communicate without too many words.