Iki Mochi

Iki Mochi works alone, on foot, and almost always before the first train. He trained as an architect in Osaka and spent nine years drawing buildings he would never see built, which is where the patience came from, and the habit of standing in one place long enough for the light to decide what the subject is.

He photographs the parts of Japan everyone has already photographed, and insists that is the point. A torii at low tide, a grove at six in the morning, a castle keep in flat white light: pictures that only separate themselves from the millions beside them by how long someone was willing to wait. He shoots in black and white because color, he says, keeps telling you where to look.

His rule is one frame a location. If it does not happen, he comes back next season.

He is a shiba inu. He does not consider this relevant to the work.