At our party at Blurb just over a week ago, we were thrilled to see Chikara Umihara's face among the attendees. He'd just gotten off a plane from Japan—yes, Japan!—to come celebrate being a Hot Shot! Chikara's work spans the gamut from documentary to more formal portraiture; our panel was taken by his series Aggressive Girls, which looks at the empowerment of lesbians in Brooklyn through male-dominant Hip Hop culture. Chikara finds his way into the intimate spaces where this subculture convenes and makes images suggesting that sometimes he and his camera are fully bared, with flash out, whereas in other scenarios he is merely a wallflower, quietly observing the colorful world as it moves around him while maintaining a calculated distance.
The macro and micro lenses of Chikara's world are a notable characteristic of each of his series: Aggressive Girls, Playland, Silent Water and Humilade. You can see all of these works on his website and learn a little more about Chikara below.
Outside of the Brazilian grocery store "Banana Boat", Nishikoizumi, Gunma Prefecture, Japan, 2010 by Chikara Umihara
Downtown, Brooklyn, 2009 by Chikara Umihara
Living in: Tokyo, Japan
Your formal and/or informal education and training in photography: I attended a one Year Certificate Program in General Studies at the International Center of Photography, New York in 2007 and interned at Magnum Photos in 2008.
How you pay the bills: Freelancing as a photographer and retoucher.
Best advice you ever received as a photographer: Photography makes me feel alive.
3 Artists Who Inspire You: Diane Arbus, John Cassavetes and Gerhard Richter
Photograph (or other work of art) that you can't get out of your head, ever: Apocalypse Now Redux
Reading now: La Casa Verde by Mario Vargas Llosa
Top 3 photo-related websites/blogs:
Hey, Hot Shot! (why thank you!)
MoMA
Dashwood Books
Next project: Thailand
Bushwick, Brooklyn, New York, 2008 by Chikara Umihara
Barbershop, Lower East Side, NYC, 2008 by Chikara Umihara