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Nature as a State of Mind
Nature as a State of Mind
May 27, 2026
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Lost in Kyoto, Kimono Woman #1, Japan, 2021, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
By bringing together new works as well as important series from recent years, the exhibition reveals the innate cohesion of the Japanese photographer’s approach. His images veer on the line between landscape and abstraction, recognition and ambiguity. Colour increasingly replaces form, without diminishing the composition. Yasuhiro Ogawa works within a Japanese photographic tradition in which nature is understood not as a subject, but a state of being – a space of both emptiness and opposition. His images are not mere representations; they are surfaces of perception onto which light, colour and continuance are inscribed. Abstraction, rather than being a stylistic tool, becomes the obvious consequence of treating the act of seeing as a tentative, unfinished process.
Often captured in transit, Ogawa’s images distill narratives into visual fragments, erasing the boundaries between city and country, man and nature, record and fiction. The artist particularly likes to travel by train; the train window becomes the interface between the inside and outside world, stasis and speed. The passing landscape loses its definition; it turns into a surface, a colour – while blur becomes a description of a temporal state. In some of his series, the photographer intensifies this effect by using specially prepared, hand-polished lenses, which imbue the image with a delicate texture – like a veil being laid over reality.
Katrin UllmannOften captured in transit, Ogawa’s images distill narratives into visual fragments, erasing the boundaries between city and country, man and nature, record and fiction. The artist particularly likes to travel by train; the train window becomes the interface between the inside and outside world, stasis and speed. The passing landscape loses its definition; it turns into a surface, a colour – while blur becomes a description of a temporal state. In some of his series, the photographer intensifies this effect by using specially prepared, hand-polished lenses, which imbue the image with a delicate texture – like a veil being laid over reality.
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Lost in Kyoto, Kimono Woman #1, Japan, 2021, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Autumn Water, Japan, 2019, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Into the Silence, Man in Yellow Light, Japan, 2021, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Lost in Kyoto, Foggy Mountains, Japan, 2016, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Lost in Kyoto, Yellow Gorge, Japan, 2022, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, On a Windy Day, Japan, 2016, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin
Yasuhiro Ogawa, Winter Train, China, 2025, courtesy Gallery Buchkunst Berlin