DOUBLE DOUBLE
Writings/ Photographs/ Poetry/ Archives
A Holly Lee and Lee Ka-sing online magazine. Published on Fridays.
李家昇黃楚喬網上雜誌，逢星期五出版
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CURRENT WORK
Sushi Grass in Paradise (A story)
written by Holly Lee
with photographs by Lee Ka-sing
(26) Hand in H/// with Gr//t Bo/ks
Then came a minute of silence in the café. The three friends sat and watched the evening sun casting shadows from the vinyl lettering adhered to the store-front window, creating partially obstructed words on the floor:
Great Cof/// goes hand in h/// with Gr//t Bo/ks
Bento broke the silence and asked, "What have you bought Yoji?"
"Two books, America by Andy Warhol, and Avedon's France. And you, you?" Yoji passed an inquiring look to both Bento and George.
"The latest book from Sally Mann: a thousand crossings; The Writings of Marcel Duchamp." Bento said.
"I've got The History of Japanese Photography. I know so little about the development of photography in Japan. Do you know this book Yoji?" Asked George.
"I know there has been an interest in rediscovering photography in the East for the past twenty thirty years. In fact Japan has a parallel development in photography like the West but largely unknown, and the world has already begun rewriting the history of photography. I have a friend in Toronto who does research on this topic and if you guys are interested, we can invite him out and chat."
"Definitely. But before we do that, let me briefly run through the book. By the way the cover design is really eye-catching." George handed the hard cover book to Bento.
Mr. Bento took over the 400 page book with both hands, "This big red sun is so Japan … wait, this is actually a huge five-blade iris. Such a clever and effective design." He paused and took a sip, "I have always thought the Japanese has a natural tendency to merge east and west culture, but before all of that, trade always came first. As early as in 1543 the Portuguese traders had already landed Tanegashima to sell their firearms. Followed by the English, Dutch and Spanish who didn't want to fall behind. The Americans came in the 1850's but their influence, good or bad, continues till today. It was also around this period the Meiji Restoration took place, creating a massive influx of western technology and culture. Japan picked up photography as soon as it was brought over from the French and the English. There were already Japanese photographers in the mid 1850s, only thirty years after the first photographs Niépce made."
"Not many people know that Japan has a photo history that paralleled and mirrored western photography, and the medium had developed with more or less the same pace along with the west. All this happened very fast just because Japan had abandoned the policy of national seclusion, and within decades, had replaced its feudal government with a constitutional monarchy and moved on to rapid modernization." complemented Yoji, but stopped before it went too deep down into history.
"But we're still fascinated by the West! Look what you've bought, Andy Warhol's America photographs and Avedon's France. Tell me what do you see in them that interest you?" George said with a smile.
"I used to think Andy Warhol's photographs were just party pictures, or snap shots of famous people, celebrities he happened to come across. But I must admit I have other thoughts now. This guy was really persistent, obsessed with images and carried a camera everywhere he went, constantly living and recording his experiences. In hindsight, he had documented an era, if not a complete picture, certain class and aspects of US life. To say Robert Frank's the Americans seemed to have experienced the quintessential America of the mid 1950s, Andy Warhol's America revealed to us, through his inner circles, and life-long pursuit of lifestyle, glimpses of the relaxed and unguarded selves of the rich and famous in the 70s and 80s. Right now I'm also looking into the history of the US, going back to as early as the 20s, an interesting period when she just climbed out of the first World War, only to march to the second." Yoji fixed his eyes on the Black and white cover of Warhol's America. Hovering over the back of the statue of Liberty, was a shot taken from an aerial point of a helicopter at night.
"Talking about wars, I noticed there's a picture book of WWI in BMV, and it says the very first war photographer was actually an American, attached to the U.S. forces fighting in the Mexican War in 1846 and 1847. These images were captured using daguerreotype, which was just invented in 1939. Unfortunately this photographer's name has been lost to history." Mr. Bento looked at the time in his cell phone, it was almost 9. The sun was getting lower, closer to the western horizon, the sky tinted a blushing red, "It's time to go?"
"Sushi Grass in Paradise" is an on-going story. To read the full length version with previous chapters, please visit- https://oceanpounds.com/blogs/sushi-grass-in-paradise
BOOKSCAPE
Lee Ka-sing
The Second-read and other Negotiation Matters (work year 2009-2010)
This series was made between 2009 and 2010, as a re-visitation of some of the books that I previously acquired. They are, in some way, a kind of dialogue. 128 works were made. In March 2010, a selection of pictures from this series was exhibited at Jerome Liebling Center for Film, Photography, and Video, in Massachusetts.
Marcel Duchamp (Gloria Moure)
世界盡頭與冷酷仙景 （村上春樹）
Sigmar Polke
Flamingo (Fujio Saimon)
Why Duchamp (Gianfranco Baruchello & Henry Martin)
孤獨國 （周夢蝶）
Some Cities (Victor Burgin)
Last Summer (Koichi inakoshi)
Photographs of China (David Hockney)
費穆 （黃愛玲）
Veronica"s Revenge (Elizabeth Janus)
Cabinet (Patrycja Orzechowska)
藝林散葉 (鄭逸梅）
花之聲
Shoji Ueda
Tokyo Comedy (Nobuyoshi Araki)
Flowers (Irving Penn)
物體系 (Jean Baudrillard)
荒蕪之臉 （管管）
Looking at Photographs (Gordon Baldwin)
OP EDITIONS
Hideo Suzuki
Equivocal perspective representation dedicated to Roland Barthes, 1995 (#96P0152)
8"x10", gelatin silver photograph
(printed in 1996)
OP Edition, with "OP editions" blind-stamp
Edition 14/20, signed and numbered on verso
Featured in the OP EDITIONS catalogue, issue 9602 in 1996
OP editions are limited edition photographs from the OP Print Program we organized since 1995. After we moved to Toronto, the Program was still in operation for the first five years. Over hundreds of artists have been included, with photographs released as small format limited editions, in 8”x10” fibre-based black and white or chromogenic colour photographs. We plan to publish here, a selection from the collection on a weekly basis. Some of the photographs from OP EDITIONS are available at OCEAN POUNDS online shop.
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DOUBLE DOUBLE
Issue 0802-2019
A Holly Lee and Lee Ka-sing online magazine. Published on Fridays.
Published by Ocean and Pounds and archived at oceanpounds.com
All rights Reserved.
Selective items in this publication are available at the OCEAN POUNDS online shop. For items featured in CURRENT WORK, VINTAGE, ARTIFACT, PUBLICATION, OBJECT, BOOKSCAPE and COLLECTION, please send a request to: mail@oceanpounds.com.
If you are a researcher or writer and want to use the material, please write us in advance. Some of the materials might have different level of copyrights involved.
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DOUBLE DOUBLE previous issues were archived at -
https://oceanpounds.com/blogs/doubledouble
leekasing.com is a portal website for current and earlier works. Apart from exhibitions, Holly and Ka-sing use extensively web platforms to display photography and writing projects. Contact us for a detail list of links.
Holly and Ka-sing currently live in Toronto with their daughter Iris, and their cat Sukimoto.
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