Nobuyoshi Araki and Daido Moriyama are living legends in the field of postwar Japanese photography. Both came to prominence in the late 1960s — Araki for intimate, at times controversial portraits of his sexual partners, Moriyama for his high-contrast, black-and-white street photographs. Both heavily influenced global trends in photography throughout the latter half of the 20th century.
Both photographers’ take a slice-of-life approach to photographing, though the lives they lead prove to be near opposites, a tension that could be summed up in the difference between interiors and exteriors. It would do a disservice to the show to talk about it in terms of the impact of particular, single images. “400 Polaroids” finds its meaning in the cacophony of multitudes and the contrast between the two artist’s styles. What is so interesting here is seeing these two artists in conversation through differing approaches to the most elemental form of photography.