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Miro Ito Story & Interview by Bill Eidson An Eye for Excellence - Introduction Article rating: 3.10

Eye for Excellence; as a photographic artist and author -- transcending art and commerce, the analog and the digital, as well as East and West

Miro Ito is a Japanese-born photographer who says she always dreamed of being an artist or a novelist.  She was born into a conservative somewhat "elitist" Japanese family and was not certain of her medium until the day she walked into a Tokyo art gallery in the early eighties for a showing of Jerry N Uelsmann's surrealistic and subjective photographs. Right then, she decided, "This is the medium for me."

This proved to be a fortunate decision, not only for her, but also for those of us who are treated to her wonderfully artistic and fanciful photographs. While Ito's work is primarily shot with conventional film formats, so unusual are her images that many people often assume they are manipulated on computer.

Ito does embrace the use of digital photography, and, in fact, sees it as her photographer generation's responsibility to create a bridge between silver halide and digital technologies.  However, she also emphasizes that regardless whether her images are created on silver halide or with pixels, the "real" photograph is created within her heart, where she feels an unconditional affection for the models (objects) to be photographed.

Miro Ito graduated from Tokyo's Keio University (where she majored in Aesthetics and Fine Art History), and moved to Germany; where she established herself in Duesseldorf as a fine art photographer, working there until 1992.  Throughout the eventful and inspiring decade spanning from the mid-eighties to mid-nineties; a decade which saw the fall of the Berlin Wall (and with it of the Soviet brand of Communism) as well as the peaceful reunification of Germany (...and Europe).  She held numerous solo-exhibitions in major German and Japanese cities.

She was also invited to participate in a number of photographic activities including:  "The Summer of Photography" in Hamburg in '89 (commemorating the 150th Anniversary of Photography), the International Contemporary Art Fair in Yokohama (NICAF), and international exhibition programs the Melkweg Foundation in Amsterdam.  Her images have been published in photo books such as, "NYMPHS - Masterpieces of 8 Japanese Top Star Photographers", "Sensual Images - 100 of the World's Top Photographers Interpret Sensual Beauty", "EROTICA", as well as CD-ROMs ("100 Japanese Photographers II", "Encyclopedia of Photography Vol.1").

Ito's photographs have also been featured in numerous international photography magazines such as: fotoMAGAZIN (1988), Color Foto (1994) and Photographie (1995) from Germany as well as Asahi Camera (1989), Commercial Photo (1992) and Cameraman (1994) from Japan, Studio Photography and Design (2000), American Photo On Campus (2001) and Petersen's Photographic Magazine (2002) from the US.

 In 1997, she became a member of the Photographic Society of Japan (PSJ), and was concurrently selected as a committee member for operation of “Month of Photography in Tokyo" program.  Her most recent exhibitions include: "Naked Equinox (KOGEN-RATAI)" in 1996 and "Booth: Encounter with the Flower Named Body" (1997" Japanese Culture Weeks" in Frankfurt), "Elegant encounter of photography and digital technology" in '98 as well as “Micro Ito's Letters from New York: Messages by He artists of Words and Photographs" in 2002 (both at the Japan Camera Industry Institute).

In 2000, Ito relocated her base of operations from Tokyo to New York to challenge the world's top-market as an artistic and professional photographer.

She has also been featured as a "photographer extraordinaire utilizing new and mixed media forms" both with her digital creation and with her creative writings by Japanese broadcasting networks and journals.

On top of this she is proactively pursuing a commitment to creative writing as an author/critic on intercultural, spiritual, women-related issues, here in the international market.  So far she has authored/edited/produced two books; "European Visions on Sensuality" and "The Art of Photography in the Digital.

“Visions on Photography in the future" - (Co-author)”

She is a member of New York Art Director's club as well as a supervisor of research and study for the Japan Camera Industry Institute.  Her most recent lectures were held for members of PWP (Professional Women Photographers) in New York in 2001 and at the international congress of the IAEA (International Association of Empirical Aesthetics) in Takarazuka (Japan) in 2002.

TGP had an opportunity to talk with her recently. One of the pleasures in discussing her work is that Miro Ito moves seamlessly between her role as a philosopher who employs photography as a spiritual medium -- and as a technically astute professional with a wonderful command of composition and light.

>>>Click here for TGP's Interview with Miro Ito. 

>>>Click here to view some of Miro Ito's work.

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