A photographer of geisha, maiko, tayū and Kyoto
A few times a year now I have short portrait sessions of about an hour with Kikugawa Tayū in Shimabara, and since these meetings are so brief, I approach them in a much different way than the longer and more formal sessions we have that last anywhere from 8 – 10 hours for me, including setting up and taking down sets.
I view these briefer encounters as a time to play photographically, to experiment and try different things.
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This portrait of Kikugawa Tayū was taken earlier this year just outside the the main gate of Shimabara, once one of the most famous entertainment districts in Japan.
According to a sign posted by the Kyoto City Office a few feet to Kikugawa’s right, Shimabara was founded in 1641 and was originally known as Nishishinyashiki. However, it came to be called Shimabara after the Shimabara Rebellion of 1637-8.
I wanted to photograph Kikugawa-san on the streets of Shimabara at least once for my project on her, but when I went to scout locations a few days before our photo session, locations were hard to come by.
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As I rode the train from Kyoto to Shiga last September, the same phrase kept running through my mind: “Your mission, should you choose to accept it…”
I was thinking about the old Mission: Impossible tv series because I wasn’t sure I was going to succeed at my mission that day. I was on my way to Shiga to attend a traditional Japanese culture event where Kikugawa Tayū, one of a handful of tayū left in Kyoto, would be performing.
I was going to photograph Kikugawa-san for the first time, but there were several obstacles in my way. The first was that there was no photography permitted at the event, so I could not photograph Kikugawa while she was dancing onstage.
The second was that I had never met Kikugawa Tayū or her okasan, the former Takasago Tayū. I would have to introduce myself, make a good impression, and photograph Kikugawa-san in less than thirty minutes, and probably closer to five or ten.
The third and probably biggest challenge was that I would be permitted to photograph Kikugawa-san in a private room sometime during the event, but I didn’t know when. I would be called when Kikugawa was ready for me. And I couldn’t see the room before I entered, so I had no idea what kind of light I would be working with.
Basically, I was flying blind.
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