Emon Photo Gallery and curator Caroline Trausch, in association with SAGE Paris, present WITTGENSTEIN by French photographer Marie Passa. This solo show is the artist's first exhibition in Japan and in Asia. 

Born in 1977 Marie Passa studied architecture and then spent 10 years working with Jean-Michel Wilmotte's studio, one of the most important architectural firms in the world. In 2006, she decided to move on and to focus solely on photography. 

From 2006 to 2009, she travelled to Asia and America and took many photographs, reflecting upon and elaborating her own personal expression. In 2010, she began to show her work in London and in Paris. 

Colour is the artist's passion, as well as the interiors of important architectural monuments. From 2010 to 2012, Passa focussed exclusively on colour. Inspired by the reflective studies on colour by the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, she produced a body of 147 works. In Asia and America, Passa photographed the interiors of buildings designed by Le Corbusier and Luis Barragàn, producing a kaleidoscope of unique works by playing with colours as if they were musical notes and by detailing the spaces around us, magnificent shelters from our everyday lives. She takes us on a journey inside of buildings, quietly offering them to the surprise of the spectator. She escapes from descriptive photographs and strives towards a truly unique pictorial rendition of the environment that surrounds us, thus pushing the limits of the photograph to a new dimension. Her distinctive work challenges the border between photography and painting, as well as reality and abstraction. 

In 2013, Passa's series WITTGENSTEIN was acclaimed at AIPAD New York, ART BASEL and PARIS PHOTO. Passa also participated in the group show YELLOW at SAGE Paris together with Christo, Cy Trombly, Arshile Gorky and Marcel Duchamp. 

Passa's work is represented in many public and private collections, including Tate, Louis Vuitton Foundation, Qatar Luxury Group, Bouygues Telecom, Guy Savoy and Jean-Michel Wilmotte. 

The artist's connection to architecture extends to her solo show at Emon Photo Gallery in Tokyo as the space is in the Togo building designed by Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, recipient of the 2014 Pritzker Prize. 

*image (left)
© Marie Passa
courtesy of the artist, Emon Photo Gallery, and SAGE Paris