Ayumi Tanaka

Ayumi Tanaka is a Japanese-born artist, living and working in New York City. Tanaka has been working on collage work by using found images from private snapshot and the Internet to explore theme of memories. She received a BFA from Osaka University of Arts in Japan in 2002, and studied at International Center of Photography in 2010. Her work has been shown internationally at exhibitions including United Photo Industries Gallery in New York, Tokyo Institute of Photography in Tokyo Japan, 25 CPW Gallery in New York, Pictura Gallery in Bloomington IN, Dumbo Arts Festival 2011 in NY, and LOOK3 festival of the Photographs 2012 in Charlottesville VA. Her work has been published at "PHat Photo (Tokyo, Japan), Lettre International (Beriln, Germany), LensCulture, GUP Magazine, Featureshoot. Tanaka was awarded International Center of Photography Director Fellowship in 2010 (New York), Grand prix at Tokyo International Photography Competition 2013 (Tokyo, New York), Photolucida Critical Mass Top 50 and Feature Shoot Emerging Photography Award 2014.

Artist Statement: Hide and Seek 

I have been working on a collage project by photographing three-dimensionally layered negatives within dioramas. My approach, with the use of fairytales to tell personal stories, is to try to silhouette the remembrance and oblivescence of my own childhood. As exposing and hiding the emotional component of my childhood and where I am today, I try to seek out the depth of memories through working with shadows of mementos. I photograph light and shadows, which are created by multiple layers of negatives within a three-dimensional diorama that function as device, to create tableaux. The stories are comprised of private snap shots, and appropriate everyday objects from the Internet as symbols, as well as the photographs that I take for collage component.