The 71st GRist is Kisei Kobayashi!
Please check out the GRist section of the old GR BLOG where he was featured.

Also, the exhibition “Asia Collection 1991-2024” (Gallery Tosei / January 9 - 25, 2025) is currently on display. Please stop by if you are in the area!

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In the summer of 2024, I visited Thailand.
After not being able to travel during COVID 19, I was itching to go.

The country I have visited the most.
More than 50 times.

The sticky tropical air clings to my skin.
I inhale it slowly and deeply into my nostrils.
It's great to be back.

From late night to early morning, this city changes its appearance.
I love the silence of this time.
So I start to walk.

The rainy season.
I find trees and plants soft and the sky about to cry.
I cradle my camera in the palm of my hand and listen carefully to their whispers.

Profile
Kisei Kobayashi
Born in Nagano, Japan in 1968. Graduated from Tokyo Polytechnic University Junior College of Photography. He joined a newspaper company as a photographer and became independent in 1991. He has traveled extensively in Asia and produced many works. In recent years, he has also been creating works in his hometown of Suwa. His photobooks, novels and other publications include “kemonomichi,” “Ai no katachi (The Shape of Love),” “Nippon no kisai (Japan's Strange Festivals),” “Mishiranu kioku (Unknown Memories),” “Mabayui zanzo (Dazzling Afterimage),” “Fukasuru yoru no nakigoe (Hatching Night Cry),” and “The Voice of Science.” His latest book is “Shasin wa wakaranai (Photography is Incomprehensible).” He won the New Photographer Award of the Photographic Society of Japan in 1997 for “DAYS ASIA” and the 22nd Tadahiko Hayashi Award in 2013 for “Toku kara kita fune (The Boats from Far Away)”, and 23rd Japan Photographic Society Award (Art Award) in 2023. His first film “TOOI&MASATO” won the Bangkok International Documentary Film Festival 2021 New Director Award, Tokyo Documentary Film Festival 2021, and other prizes.
https://www.kobayashi-kisei.com/