Memory Marches Fourth
23 Sandy Gallery is pleased to present Memory Marches Fourth, photographs by Motoya Nakamura opening February 7 and running through March 8, 2008. Memory Marches Fourth features photographs of Portland’s dazzling MarchFourth Marching Band. The photographs capture the band’s roughly 30-member troupe of musicians and performance artists both on stage and behind the scenes. Nakamura, a staff photographer for The Oregonian, has been photographing the band since 2005 in what started out as a feature assignment and grew into a personal project as he befriended band members and gained backstage access to performances and rehearsals.
Nakamura’s photographs of the band are cinematographic in style and are influenced by his third-grade obsession with old European movies including Fellini’s La Strada. Nakamura begged his parents to let him watch late night cinema on TV while growing up in Nagoya, Japan. “The movies made me feel both insecure and excited at the same time in a completely foreign world, far away from home,” Nakamura says. His parent’s once-a-week indulgence grew into an obsession that has influenced his artistic endeavors ever since. His photographs consistently have a time flow instead of completely still moment.
MarchFourth, Oregon’s favorite marching band is a quirky cast of characters in rag-tag costumes that include not only a great horn section, but a zany burlesque-dancing, stilt-walking, fire-breathing cast and crew. Their performances recall Gypsy brass bands, traveling carnivals, Mardi Gras and even New Orleans Jazz funerals. This exhibition is scheduled to coincide with the band’s fifth anniversary concert, which will take place on March 4, 2008 at the Crystal Ballroom in Portland.
Artist Statement
My photographs are very cinematographic in style. They consistently have the time flow instead of completely still moment. I like to leave the hint for the fact that no time is still: always moving.
My aesthetic endeavor started in 1971 when I was in the third grade in Nagoya, Japan where I grew up. I was so obsessed with old European movies including Fellini’s La Strada. Once a week, my parents allowed me to see the late night (11p.m.) European cinema program on TV. Often, I felt such a strong belonging to scenes in the movies (I can’t remember any specific scenes now and I can’t explain why I felt that belonging). I felt that I was in the cinema scenes, watching and following people. I felt both insecure and excited at the same time in a completely foreign world, far away from home. During the same period, I intensely looked at paintings by Rembrandt and Lubens and had similar experiences.
While I studied English and Spanish hoping to see foreign countries in college in Japan, I read “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger in English. More than ten years later, I experienced the same feeling through the book. The book was the first book that made me visualize scenes even though I have never lived in the United States. That encouraged me to move to the United States where I learned photography to catch the feeling.
My photographs explore the feeling that I always have had within me in the current environment wherever I live. When I photographed MarchFourth Marching Band marching on NE. Mississippi Street in Portland on Mardi Gras, the same insecure and excited feeling came back to me. This is the beauty that I see, feel and want to catch in my photographs. And my goal as a photographer is to convey the thrill to see the beauty being unveiled in front of your eyes.
Artist Biography
I was born in 1963 in Nagoya, Japan, where most Toyota cars get shipped to the United States and other countries from (the only reference I can use globally to explain about my home town. I always refer my home city as “Detroit” of Japan. I was always interested in foreign countries. When I was a third grader, I painted me on a flying horse over a nonspecific Arabic country, which got exhibited at the Nagoya City Hall. I probably got the idea from Arabian Nights. My first foreign country was Melbourne, Australia and New Plymouth, New Zealand, where I home stayed with two nice families. I was 17.
I studied both Spanish and English at Nanzan University, a Catholic University in Nagoya, hoping to travel all over the world after graduation. I graduated with BA in Spanish in 1987. I read whatever original books (not translated into Japanese) I could found in Nagoya. They were limited but I read “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger. I fell in love with the book and decided to go to the United States, from which the book came. After saving money for two yeas by teaching windsurfing (because I do not have to wear a tie), I enrolled myself to the School of Journalism at University of Missouri-Columbia, where I got introduced to documentary photography. As a student, I did four newspaper photography internships in four different states (Indiana, New York, Virginia and North Carolina). Working for newspapers gave me tickets to unknown worlds everyday.
After the school, I became a staff photographer at Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Virginia, where I learned documentary photography not only to record the history but also to make it an art. I also met my wife Beth, also a staff photographer there and got married. After 8 years, we were both ready to move on to a more progressive place. We chose Portland, where I became a father of two sons and I have worked as a staff photographer for The Oregonian since 2000.
© Motoya Nakamura/The Oregonian
Archival Pigment Print
To inquire about purchasing this work,
please contact Laura at 23 Sandy.