SOKOHI
Moe Suzuki
Moe Suzuki was born in Tokyo in 1984. After studying photography at London College of Communications, University of the Arts London, she started her career as an artist in Tokyo. She works in the form of hand-bound books, combining the medium of photography, archives, and illustrations. SOKOHI won Special Mention at the Kassel Dummy Award 2020 (Germany) and the Luma Rencontres Dummy Award 2021 (France). She currently lives and works in Tokyo.
© Moe Suzuki - Statement -
“Sokohi” literally means “shadow in the bottom” or “shadow in the eye” and is a Japanese word that has been used since old times as a common name for eye diseases that cause visual impairment due to some abnormality in the eye. This project is about Suzuki’s father, who has been suffering from progressive glaucoma, “Ao-Sokohi,” for the past 15 years. His field of vision gradually narrowing, his gaze meeting hers less and less. Through visually reconstructing her father’s old journals and photographs, and the present image of him relying on sound as he tries to connect his senses to the outside world, Suzuki expresses in this work the world as it unfolds in front of her father's eyes, which she herself, who is sighted, would never be able to see.