From the Library: Sugimoto: Architecture

As the year comes to a close — quickly, slowly — time eludes us once again. Looking back on the year, memories of these last three unconventional years seem to come and go in a kind of amalgam, each memory without any definitive timestamp.

The work of Hiroshi Sugimoto seems appropriate for this sentiment. Known for his signature way of documenting theaters, seascapes, and architecture with his dream-like mixture of infinte focus and prolonged exposure, Sugimoto’s work seems to be in direct dialogue with the passing of time. As I pull Sugimoto: Architecture off the shelf and get lost in its pages, I find myself meditating on these architectural visions. The work seems to be timeless, universal and without authorship in some way: Did I take this photo of the Schindler House? Did Schindler take it back in 1922? Even the structures I have never physically experienced seem to generate a recollection, a remembering in a very tangible way. The blur of his infinite focus renders each structure at the threshold of recognition, somehow getting to its true distilled essence. From Peter Zumthor's Saint Benedict Chapel in Switzerland to Tadao Ando's Sumiyoshi House in Japan, from the spiritural to the secular, each plate here draws you in for contemplation.

Sugimoto: Architecture was first shown at The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago in 2003 and was curated by Francesco Bonami. The photos here were taken of the exhibition’s catalog, also titled Sugimoto: Architecture, and was published by D.A.P. Words by Preston Alba.