Tokyo: Tomoko Yoneda
By Darryl Wee
REVIEWS
Several works capture moments that are finely balanced between the intimacy of courting couples in public and a sense of anonymity that comes, ironically, from staking out a private refuge in the midst of public space. In Lovers II (2008), a couple is seated on an unruly patch of grass and weeds in Lalbagh Fort, in Dhaka. Surrounded by the discolored remains of brick walls damaged in the 1971 conflicts, the couple enacts a furtive, personal ritual, their gazes downturned even as they sit across from each other. These young lovers dally in the quiet grove, unwittingly reoccupying a site of historic tumult that has now become “neutral” territory.
