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Motoi Ichihara's work has focused on the elements of ice, water, and fire. Currently, he is pursuing the theme of the world's food supply, gathering material from the Arctic and Antarctic, Asia, South Asia, and Africa. |
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"My initial motive for taking up photography was sibling rivalry."
I first discovered photography when I was in the second grade of junior high school. Initially, I wanted to be a painter. But my brother, who is five years older than me, beat me to it and became a professional artist in the field of Japanese painting. To avoid taking the same route as my rival sibling, I gave up the idea of painting and started taking photos with a camera we happened to have at home.
At the time, I thought of photography simply as a hobby, and felt no particular ambition to pursue it as a career. But I did enter contests, contribute to camera magazines, and join a photography club for adults - where I'm sure I came across as being somewhat cocky.
It was obvious I needed a way to express myself other than through painting. For me, studying and arguing, as well as photography, were all modes of self-expression. I always did my best when quarreling, but I could never beat my closest rivals, namely my two older brothers, physically or in any other way. I had to find something I was better at than both of them.
We lived in a port town in Shikoku, and as a result I often took photos of scenes in the nearby harbor. Having been raised in that kind of environment, watching nothing but the ocean since I was little, I have always felt a strong urge to visit unknown regions and lands across the sea.
Anyway, since I wanted to make movies, which seemed like the ultimate combination of music, images, and literature, I studied cinema at the Nihon University College of Art. But soon after graduating, I had a change of heart and decided to return to the same university to take a second degree, this time in photography. So I was 25 years old, and had earned two degrees, before I finally left university. Neither my age nor my temperament inclined me to take a company job, so I plunged straight in and began my career as a freelance photographer.
Even before that, while still at university I had often gone to Lake Biwa to take photographs, and I'd stayed in Alaska and Greenland for about three months looking for suitable subjects to shoot. Looking back, that was probably when my career as a photographer began. I've also been taking photographs related to food around Lake Biwa since 1972. It's an ongoing project, and I have a huge collection of photos I need to get organized soon.
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