Kogen-Ji / The Gardens of Yamagata
Japanese Gardens are the material things that form the subject matter of this exhibition. They are also supreme artistic achievements from a very great culture. The photographer who approaches them is faced with the very formidable task of trying to use one art form to do justice to another. If he is successful he must somehow convey the truth of the first medium in terms that are true to the second. This is the task that William Corey has so admirably undertaken in his monumental study of the gardens of Japan.
The Japanese garden offers rich and rewarding experiences: it grows and develops over time and changes constantly from season to season. Though carefully conceived, it is a natural environment that accepts progress and the cycles of nature as part of its design. It is fashioned for human contemplation and enjoyment, and is rich in both illusion and allusion. It is a garden to be seen, felt and contemplated-a living environment for both the body and the mind. It offers a superb-indeed matchless-collaboration of man and nature.
Yet, Japanese gardens do not represent a common subject in the realm of fine art photography. They elude our customary notion of what a garden is and the intentions behind them are not easily read, particularly by those outside the culture. Meaning is often complex, often understated and buried within the form. Endless photographs of their physical elements has done little to convey their essence, which is often implied rather than stated. Content with recording surfaces, most photographers have come away from them with pictures that appear to document painted scenery.
William Corey, in contrast, was intent on making not just images of but images about the Japanese garden. He set out specifically and deliberately to capture the spirit of the gardens and to invest his photographs with it. This goal, which he has pursued with a singular passion for nineteen years is what distinguishes him from other garden photographers. Insistent on rendering not only the surface but the substance, the very ethos of garden art, he has become by virtue of that choice an interpreter of his subjects.
His body of imagery forms one man's intensely subjective response to, what many consider, the very soul of Japanese culture: a response which combines a unique style, vision and craftsmanship. The fact that the Japanese have selected him to photograph their Imperial Gardens suggests their trust and belief in his ability to render them with fidelity and deep understanding.
His mastery of natural light, his unstrained but highly structured compositional sense all point to a highly developed and classically influenced way of seeing. Yet, he goes further. His body of work expands the way that people see and know photographs as well as the subjects they portray. Corey takes the extremely small terrain of the negative and shapes it with such precision that people can sense the spiritual terrain that exists both in the design of the garden and the heart of the artist. Such a congruence when shaped by a highly disciplined and trained eye produces works of art that bring the subject matter to the viewer in entirely new and refreshing ways.
Since his style consistently echoes and reinforces his vision, Corey's images are anything but accidental. They are all carefully planned and pre-visualized, consciously designed to fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. He is utterly dedicated to craft, and yet always determined that craft be a means to an end - never an end in itself. It is this transcendental end that dictated his use of the extremely demanding large-format camera. Control of the 8 X 20 banquet camera requires commitment and craftsmanship of a very high order, yet the rewards are great. Corey shows that this camera can give images with tonality, detail and depth that are impossible to get with other instruments.
Ultimately, the work of William Corey must be seen as a simultaneous portrait and self-portrait, a blend of fact and feeling which demands a response as strong as the commitment which went into it's making. That labor begins with the realization that just as William Corey stole the spirit of the gardens, they in turn stole his. Contemplate these images long enough and it may happen to you.
From: Camera Obscura Gallery Exhibition /June, 1998
