Following Seeds

On January 1, we moved to Tokyo, with a plan to stay for six months (the maximum duration that Japan allows without a visa). Living abroad is something that I have wanted to do for a long time, and it seems like if you’re gonna do it, you might as well go somewhere as different as possible. I had been to Japan a few times previously for short trips, and just loved it there. Mostly because it felt opposite in every way to living in the US.

My goals for the next six months, apart from immersing myself in a new culture and way of daily living, are to figure out a way to share OneClock with Japan, and to make an art project in Japan. I really want to build the art project around traditional (water-based) woodblock printing, since Japan has such a rich history of Mokuhanga.

Most of our first weeks involved walking around Tokyo and getting to know our neighborhood. The city is densely layered, unfathomably complex, and seemingly endless. Photography is my way of understanding my surroundings, so it has been fun to make pictures again. So far I have only used my iPhone 15 Pro which is insanely good. My Canon is sitting untouched.

What am I looking for in these pictures? Often it’s just some little thing that makes me laugh or appreciate being here. Or it’s some harmonic meeting of colors and shapes that feels good. Either way, it’s a sort of resonance, a frequency that I try to tune into and sense. Being open to this frequency takes practice — and to be honest I feel a little rusty. But Tokyo is a perfect place to break up that rust. There’s just so much to see, everywhere, all the time.

This picture above is the view out the window of our house. It’s the first thing I see when I get up in the morning. Before heading downstairs to make a coffee, I stand and look out the window, and think about how much possibility there is: in Tokyo, in the world, in each of our individual lives.

The photos below were made walking around during my first few months in Tokyo. They are images of trying to make sense of a new place — images of orientation and calibration. While my surroundings are totally new, the elements of form, light, and color remain familiar. Being in a foreign place causes us to look for the familiar, as a way to find a sense of security and safety. These are seeds that I’m following, trusting that they will lead me where I want to go.