is a Japanese photographer. He is the co-founder of and the main contributor to the Japanese photo magazine Asphalt. His work has been exhibited both in Japan and internationally.
Life and career Fujiwara was born in Okayama City in 1963. His family soon moved to Ōyamazaki (Kyoto), and moved again to Shiga when he was at primary school.Naoto Ohsumi, "On photography as a voyage, human life and death, and home", afterword to Semimaru. He lived in Yasu (Shiga) until he was 26,故郷の記憶たどる 1年かけ向き合い撮影 県出身の藤原敦さん、大津できょうから /滋賀, Mainichi Shinbun, 6 October 2018. and considers himself a native of Shiga.
After working as an interior designer, Fujiwara went to Britain in 1989, working as an architectural designer and in the restaurant business. Back in Japan, in 2005 he set up a photographic studio."Kuchie nōto" () = "Photographer's biography", Nippon Camera, December 2012, page 91. A year later, he started out as a photographer,Yasunobu Ichii (), "Fujiwara Atsushi Asphalt (Asufaruto)" (), Nippon Camera, December 2012, pages 134–135. this unusually late start being helped by the photographers and Daidō Moriyama.
Together with the photographer Shin'ichirō Tōjinbara (), Fujiwara set out to create a photography magazine, Asphalt, that would avoid the commercial priorities of mainstream Japanese photography and photography magazines, and that would run for just ten issues. From the second issue on, Akira Hasegawa () joined as editor, and the normal pattern was to combine work by Fujiwara, Tōjinbara and, as a guest photographer, someone who was not already a star but who instead merited exposure.Dirk Rösler, "The paths of photography: Asphalt", Japan Exposures, 23 March 2010. These guest photographers included ) and Takehiko Nakafuji ().List of contributing photographers, Asphalt archive. Asphalt is in the holdings of several art museums outside Japan, by Akina (a photobook publisher) of Fujiwara about Asphalt. and its content is available online.Archive of the magazine Asphalt.
Nangokusho: Ode to the Southern Lands of Japan (2013) was the first of four photobooks by Fujiwara to be published by , each of these containing work in black and white. It borrows the title Nangokushō () from a collection of tanka by Fujiwara's grandfather, Tōmon Fujiwara (the pseudonym of Hiroji Fujiwara), who, after workplace conflicts elsewhere, had eventually settled down to a satisfying post as teacher in Kagoshima.Akira Hasegawa, "Journey to a phantasm", afterword to Nangokusho. The book presents photographs of Kagoshima from 2009 and 2010.Description (in Japanese) of the book Nangokusho by Shuntaro Kanekiyo; visual presentation of it by Josef Chladek; review of it by Adam Bell.
Butterfly Had a Dream shows the family life in Miyako-jima and the work and single life in Tokyo of a professional kinbaku practitioner. Her father, a suicide victim, had been a professional butterfly collector, and the book brings to mind the metamorphoses in the life of a butterfly.Visual presentation of the book Butterfly Had a Dream by Josef Chladek; review of it by Jan-Frederik Rust; short interview by 3/3 of Fujiwara and the book's designer (Koichi Hara) about it.
As a child, Fujiwara had visited Nagashima Aiseien, a leper sanatorium, whose general manager was an uncle of his. He returned there 35 years later, influenced by Kaijin Akashi, who had been incarcerated there and had died there, but whose poems continued to express joy despite his loss of sight and other physical decay., 明石海人（1901–1939）, Ikeda's website (Osaka University). For his book Poet Island (2015), Fujiwara photographed the sanatorium and depicted mementoes of Akashi's. Recommending an exhibition of these photographs at Zen Foto Gallery (Roppongi), Kōtarō Iizawa praised this and Fujiwara's two previous photobooks as of high quality.Kōtarō Iizawa, Fujiwara Atsushi, Shijin no shima (), Artscape, 15 April 2015.Review (in Spanish) of the book Poet Island by Gabriela Cendoya; review of it by Christer Ek; review of it by Jan-Frederik Rust.
Semimaru (2017) is named after that in turn is named after its main character. The book looks for traces of Semimaru on and elsewhere in what is now Shiga prefecture.Visual presentation of the book Semimaru by Josef Chladek; review of it by Jan-Frederik Rust.
Exhibitions Trace, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2009.Exhibition notice for Trace, Sokyu-sha. Asphalt photo exhibition, Rencontres d'Arles (Arles, France), 2010 (with work by Kōji Onaka and Photographer Hal);"Coup d’envoi demain des Rencontres d’Arles 2010, temps fort de la photographie", Zone Numerique, 20 July 2010. Zen Foto Gallery (Beijing), 2011 (with work by Yang Seung-Woo and Muge);Exhibition notice for "Asphalt Three Photographers' Exhibition", Zen Foto Gallery. Tanto Tempo Gallery (Kobe, Japan), 2012 Kagoshima, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2010.Exhibition notice for Kagoshima, Sokyu-sha. Poet's island, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2011.Exhibition notice for Poet's Island, Sokyu-sha. Butterfly had a dream, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2012;Exhibition notice for Butterfly had a dream, Sokyu-sha. Tanto Tempo Gallery (Kobe, Japan), 2014; Reclaim Photography West Midlands 2016, Wolverhampton Art Gallery, England, 2016; 6th Different Dimension Festival, the State Novosibirsk Art Museum, Russia, 2016 Nangokusho, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2013;Exhibition notice for Nangokusho, Sokyu-sha. Tanto Tempo Gallery (Kobe, Japan), 2014;Exhibition notice for Nangokusho, Tanto Tempo Gallery.小吹隆文, 藤原敦 写真展 南国頌─幻影への旅─ 同時開催：蝶の見た夢, Artscape, 5 July 2014. Reclaim Photography Festival, Lighthouse Media Centre (Wolverhampton, England), 2018 Nangokusho (together with work by Yang Seung-Woo and Tomohisa Tobitsuka), In)(between record vol. 1, In)(between Art Gallery (Paris), 2013.Exhibition notice for In)(between record vol. 1, In)(between Art Gallery."Atsushi Fujiwara", In)(between Art Gallery. Japanese Eyes, In)(between record vol. 12, In)(between Art Gallery (Paris), 2014. Group exhibition.Exhibition notice for In)(between record vol. 12, In)(between Art Gallery. Poet Island, Zen Foto Gallery (Roppongi Tokyo), 2015;Exhibition notice for Poet Island, Zen Foto Gallery. Gallery722 (Okayama, Japan), 2015; Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2015;Exhibition notice for Poet Island (at both Sokyu-sha and Gallery722), Sokyu-sha. Reclaim Photography West Midlands (Birmingham, England), 2017 Semimaru, Sokyu-sha Gallery (Shinjuku, Tokyo), 2017; Gallery722 (Okayama, Japan), 2017.Exhibition notice for Semimaru (at both Sokyu-sha and Gallery 722), Sokyu-sha. Un regard sur ses publications = A Look into His Publications, In)(between record vol. 31, In)(between Art Gallery (Paris), 2017.Exhibition notice for A Look into His Publications, In)(between Art Gallery. Tukurohi, Mii-dera (Ōtsu, Japan), 2018.Exhibition notice for Tukurohi, 47news, 19 June 2018. Semimaru, within Beauty in Imperfection (group show), Reclaim Photography Festival West Midlands (Birmingham England), 2020Exhibition notice for Beauty in Imperfection, Reclaim Photography Festival. 2200Miles, Books and Modern, Tokyo, 2020Exhibition notice for 2200Miles, Books and Modern. + Blue Sheep Gallery Tokyo, 2020 2200Miles, Gallery722 (Okayama, Japan), 2020 Butterfly Had a Dream, Casa Da Caltura De Avintes, Portugal), 2021 2200Miles, Rosphoto (Saint Petersburg, Russia), 2024 2200Miles, Gallery Negative (Busan, South Korea), 2024 Butterfly Had a Dream, Space S (Busan, South Korea), 2024 Sakura River, Zen Foto Gallery (Tokyo, Japan), 2024
Publications Asphalt (10 issues). Asphalt Publishing, 2008–2012. Nangokushō () = Nangokusho: Ode to the Southern Lands of Japan. Tokyo: Sokyu-sha, 2013. . Chō no mita yume () = Butterfly Had a Dream. Tokyo: Sokyu-sha, 2014. . Wombat No. 16. Paris: Wombat, 2015. Contains a print by Fujiwara, a portfolio by William Klein, a print by Utagawa Hiroshige, and a "silkscreen print with Aesop complicity".Publisher's description of Wombat No. 16. Shijin no shima () = Poet Island. Tokyo: Sokyu-sha, 2015. . Semimaru () = Semimaru. Tokyo: Sokyu-sha, 2017. 2200Miles. Tokyo: Sokyu-sha, 2019. Sakura River. Tokyo: Zen Foto Gallery, 2024.
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References
External links Fujiwara's website