(English Follows)

これは四十歳位の時に綴ったものです。「私は写真を初めて三十余年になります。しかし私は写真の面白さが、ほんの数年前に判りかけた様な気がいたします。やっと写真の入り口を見つけた気持ちなのです。この考え方は、私がこれから先、写真の道を歩んで行くうえで、いつの時点でも同じ事だと思います。私が、五十歳になった時、六十歳になった時でも、ほんの数年前に写真が少し判りかけたと思う事でしょう。私は、写真を心から信じています。写真は、私にとって信仰かも知れません。そして、写真をする行為は私にとって、世間との、唯一の窓口なのです。いつかはたどりつけるかも知れない窓口に向かって、これからも写真を創りつづけるつもりです。」今私は六十四歳です。

――三好耕三「SEE SAW(2010)」展覧会テキストより

15年ぶりの”コーゾー”との展覧会は、やはり自分自身の「目の記憶」を巡礼することだった。自分が幼い時から慣れ親しんだ、バライタ印画紙の質感、そこに写っている白黒の風景。ずっと眺めてきたその写真たちから、知らず知らず自分が学んでいたのは「目に映るものが全てじゃない、でもひとまずそれを信じてみよう」ということだったのかもしれない、とふと感じた。

まだ見ぬ世界の姿への予感・憧れを持ちつつ、眼前に広がる世界への情愛と信頼をもとにシャッターを切る。決して満足することはない代わりに、また次へと歩んでいく楽しさをずっと持ち続けていけること。世の中はわからないことばかり。むしろ「わかった」と言えることは本当に僅かしかないから、まずは信じてみることの大切さがある。コーゾーが「写真の面白さが判りかけた」というその確かな実感は、その場への固執ではなく、また彼を次の場所へと運んでいく。その先に広がっている「わからなさ」と触れ合うために。

「目の記憶」には、目で見たことの記憶だけではなくて、その風景の先に見据えた、自分だけの「向こう側」が含まれている。コーゾーが写真を創り続けてくれるから、僕もその向こう側へ、ずっと旅を続けていられるんです。

This was something I wrote when I was around forty years old. “I have been involved with photography for more than thirty years now. And yet, I feel as though I have only just begun to understand what is truly interesting about photography a few years ago. It feels as though I have finally found the entrance to photography. I believe this way of thinking will remain the same at any point as I continue along the path of photography. When I turn fifty, when I turn sixty, I will probably still feel that I have only just begun to understand photography a few years earlier. I believe in photography with all my heart. Photography may be a form of faith for me. And the act of making photographs is, for me, my only window to the world. Toward that window—one I may or may not ever reach—I intend to keep creating photographs.” I am now sixty-four years old.

――From the exhibition text of Kozo Miyoshi, SEE SAW (2010)

An exhibition with “Kozo” after fifteen years turned out, once again, to be a pilgrimage through my own “memory of seeing.” The texture of baryta paper I had been familiar with since childhood, the black-and-white landscapes captured on it. From those photographs I had long been looking at, perhaps without realizing it, what I learned was this: “What appears before our eyes is not everything—but for now, let us try believing in it.” That thought suddenly comes to mind.

Holding a sense of anticipation and longing for worlds not yet seen, while grounding each shutter release in affection for and trust in the world unfolding before one’s eyes. Never reaching satisfaction, and yet retaining the joy of continuing onward, step by step. The world is full of things we do not understand. In fact, what we can truly say we “understand” is only very little. That is why there is importance in first choosing to believe. His firm realization that he has “begun to understand what is interesting about photography” does not bind him to one place; instead, it carries him onward to the next. So that he may encounter the vast “unknowing” that lies ahead.

The “memory of seeing” includes not only what the eyes have seen, but also one’s own personal “beyond,” glimpsed past the landscape itself. Because he continues to create photographs, I, too, can keep traveling—always—toward that beyond.