SHIMA NO AMA – Kusukazu Uraguchi

For centuries, the ama – Japanese fisherwomen – have fed the Japanese imagination. These freedivers collect abalone, shellfish and seaweed, the sale of which ensures their financial independence at home. Kusukazu Uraguchi (1922-1988) has been photographing them in the Shima region, along Japan’s Pacific coast, since the mid-1950s and for over thirty years. The fruit of extensive research into almost 40,000 negatives – almost all of them previously unpublished – this remarkable archive of landscapes, portraits and underwater views tells the story of the daily life and special place of the ama community in Japanese society.

Uraguchi’s images are as much about cultural heritage as they are about modernity, as these communities have undergone profound changes in the wake of the wave of urbanisation that swept Japan after the war. His photographic language – the plastic strength of his contrasting blacks and whites, his sense of decadence, the spontaneity of his gestures – celebrates the freedom of the body, solidarity and the spirit of independence.

To illuminate the many facets of this work, the visual corpus is accompanied by a text by Sonia Voss that reveals the mysterious world of this community, as well as a text by Chihiro Minato that places this work in the history of photography. A glossary, inspired by the writings of Japanese ethnologist Kiyoko Segawa and dedicated to the world of fishing and these divers, reveals all the richness and technicality of their discipline.

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