Street Focus 44: Streets Of The World – Tokyo With Brian Wood-Koiwa

[smart_track_player url=”http://media.blubrry.com/thisweekinphoto/p/content.blubrry.com/thisweekinphoto/Street_Focus_044_Streets_of_the_World_Tokyo.mp3″ color=”6a1915″ title=”Streets Of The World – Tokyo With Brian Wood-Koiwa” artist=”Street Focus 44″ ] Street Focus 44: Streets Of The World – Tokyo With Brian Wood-Koiwa

In this Streets of the World episode of Street Focus, I'm taking you to Tokyo, Japan and photographer Brian Wood-Koiwa is your local guide for this adventure.

Brian Wood-Koiwa is a Tokyo-based American fine-art photographer. He has lived/worked and travelled around the world, in places such as Qatar, Ecuador, Thailand, Australia, and as a Peace Corps Volunteer in central Africa (training in Cameroun and Gabon and posted to the rainforests of the Republic of Congo), before settling down in and around Tokyo. He has been living in Tokyo for over 13 years, so his photography is inspired by the juxtaposition of the ultra-modern and traditional aspects for which this megalopolis is known.

He calls his photographic (and fiction writing) style “Urban Weird”: emphasizing the phantasmagorical of the seemingly urban mundane through composition and post-processing in the digital darkroom. His main focus is anything urban (urban landscape, cityscape, street, urban abstract) and the temples and shrines that dot the city, at times existing harmoniously and other times not so harmoniously, but interestingly, with the vertical steel and glass bones of the city. He does also enjoy photographing the sublime natural wonders that surround Tokyo that help contain the urban chaos.

Shinjuku Station area on Yamanote Line.

East exit – Shopping/nightlife

West exit (nishishinjuku) – Business and hotels

Harajuku on Yamanote Line – trendy/young/to be seen/crowded

Shibuya Station area

Shibuya crossing – Bladerunner-esque

Ueno Station area

Main hub for Shitamachi downtown area – Old town feel neighborhood temples

Asakusa very ‘shitamachi' Sanso-ji temple/Sumida River

Tokyo Skytree: Tallest utility tower and second tallest structure in the world building. Observatories 340 and 450 meters high