Jasper de Beijer

2006 Kamiyama Artist in Residence participant
In Kamiyama from September 18 to November 18, 2006

Born and raised in Amsterdam, Holland in 1973. Originally a real drawing fetishist and a true Hokusai fan, he discovered the advantage of digital media to enhance traditional techniques. Having received the Thieme Art Award in 2005 and receiving a grant from the Dutch government, Jasper is using this stimulus to look for the edge of his own imagery.(→ Jasper de Beijer website)

At work in his studio

Heroes and Ghosts

Jasper de Beijer“Heros and Ghosts”2006

In the photo series Heroes and Ghosts is the description of an outsider of the space that forms the backbone of a part Japanese popular and traditional culture, reconstructed mere from its outings. Behind the cover of manga magazines, the erotic elements, the violent and primitive nature of man goes hand in hand with an outrageously refined sense of beauty. Jasper collected hundreds of fragments and complete scenes out of these comics to use them as a series of scale models. The end result is an attempt to materialize the world in which the comics take place, this extremely confined world without borders: the archaic images that reappear repetitively, combining traditional values and ideas with fears and desires that mark the modern man.
Jasper, focusing on the long-standing Japanese comic culture such as Otogizoshi tales (illustrated short stories) and caricatures, used the manga comics which still serve as part of popular culture, as the base for his work. He cut out sequences and objects in comics as imagery unique to Japan, and used them to create a series of scale models by attaching the cut pieces on many sides. He then shot three-dimensional dioramas looking like a movie set, and after digitally processing the images with the computer, created a final photo piece. Various techniques and processes were employed to produce a single photo.