Future Déjà Vu: Rome presents an ancient city seen from several unique perspectives. Yasuomi Hashimura is utilizing the same innovative techniques featured in the rest of the series and experimenting with the idea of time as seen through a future generation’s lens. The artworks in this series become their own relics and mementos of a past otherwise potentially forgotten.
Hashimura originally drew inspiration for the series from viewing platinum prints and observing the darkened edges framing the image. Not content to simply create works already seen, Hashimura decided to take this idea one step further. He merged his talents in calligraphy, photography and darkroom printing to create images featuring an imagined world. In this way Hashimura turns a simple photograph into a unique artistic object. These artworks have a depth and complexity, the viewer torn between observing the abstract aspects and the beauty of the original photographic image.
At times the artworks appear as though they are disappearing from view. This is the case in “Pantheon II”, where the edges of the photograph are gone, replaced by gentle, abstract brushstrokes and chemical splatters. Hashimura is experimenting with tone, pushing the very limits of photography until the ideas of one art form blend into another. The titles feature the approximate date the artwork or architecture pictured was created, followed by the year the photograph was printed. This allows the viewer to ponder the different centuries pictured in one image – what will be the next moment in time that is captured?
With its inherent change and transformation, time often evokes a vague anxiety toward its ceaseless flow, as well as a resignation toward the fact that all things will inexorably fade away. Hashimura imagines these works viewed centuries from now, looking back through the haze of time and memory.
''There are traces that endure in our hearts and cannot be erased.” Hashimura muses “There are genes, we have inherited from the past which cannot be forgotten or destroyed even in these fast changing times. We will bequeath these to the next generation and the generation after that. But one thousand years from now, what will remain and what will have been preserved from our present moment? I wonder what you, the viewer, will take away from these works as you stand before them. Perhaps they might trigger your own Future Déjà Vu."