An Aesthetics of Everyday Life series by Japanese photographer Junya Suzuki, is a documentary that seeks for feeling in everyday life.
Since ancient times, Japanese has had a unique aesthetic sense referred to as “wabi-sabi”. Generally, this aesthetic prefers the mundane over the showy, quietude over eloquence, and stillness over movement. Japanese came to see items in their natural state as pure, while those modified by human as impure. Seeking the natural essence of things, this aesthetic sensibility was produced from themselves.
However, almost no opportunity to hear the aesthetic exists in modern times. As the time goes by, and as human comes to see the surface of things, they might have lost such a mind of aesthetic.
One day, I found the common point in photos I captured. That’s the quietness not the boisterousness. I unconsciously may feel the aesthetic sense like “wabi-sabi” in the environment which keeps creating, destroying and changing all the time.
Nothing is permanent in this world. And we know life is not endless. That’s why I suspect that we can have a feeling in existing together in harmony.
Text and images © Junya Suzuki
