Code Unknown

As an homage (and a tribute) to film director Michael Haneke who directed a film of the same title, Code Unknown, Satoshi boarded a train in Berlin with his camera and photographed strangers from 6am to 8pm for several months, just like the photographer character in Haneke’s film, who takes candid photographs of passengers sitting in front of him on a train. Each photo is then edited to the point where the identity of his subjects cannot be known. “In real society, I cannot publish those photographs. Therefore, I photographed by aiming where each ‘model’ cannot be identified individually. I attempted to erase each of their identifications and individualities by trimming the clothes they were wearing from the screen.” Described as “painful, dramatic and sensitive” by Stella Succi, the editor of Italy’s “Mousse” contemporary art magazine, Fujiwara’s fragmented anonymous portraits present a new approach to the issue of privacy and portraits rights in today’s visual culture.