KT: How did you get into photography? When/what was your first encounter with Photography?
SN: I was 18 when I became interested in photography; what started as a small thing became everything.
KT: Your work is intimate, personal, sensual, romantic which is visible in your various book projects ranging from ‘Tsukuyomi’ (2005), ‘Kondo Ryohei’ (2006), ‘Kuroyami – Black Darkness’ (2008), ‘Hotel Pegasus’ & NUDE / A ROOM / FLOWERS (2012) and your recent one being ‘GUN’ (2016), in which you spent three days with six models, interweaving the power of wilderness and mans’ intimate nature. What do you enjoy about photography in a book-format? How do you select your subject for your book-projects?
SN: The book is a fundamental part. Someone once told me that he reads my book in bed, which made me feel very excited. The book then becomes the secret relationship I have with my audience. The audience and I become accomplices and can share secret stories.
The experience around making GUN was very unique. I tend to focus on small voices in small spaces where I can reach with my hand. I thought that shooting with 6 people in nature would become a new big thing, but at the end, I once again found the small voice, the very moving small thing.
KT: Being a long-time assistant of the ‘Erotic Genius’ – Nobuyoshi Araki, what has been your most inspiring episode of your long-term working relationship with him? Did you get your inspiration for nudes from your master? What is your photographic fantasy?
SN: I started to shoot nudes during my college years. That attracted a lot of people around me each time I wanted to shoot and that’s how things continued. I would prefer not to talk too much about Araki, but let’s just say that everything he says, talks and everything around him affects me in my life and my photography.
KT: Known for your male nudes, you have celebrated eroticism in a very unique way. What do you find fascinating about portraiture as a genre to connect with your audience?
SN: It is not only in the nudes, but I aim to connect small fluctuations, big sorrow, life and death, everything that you love that surrounds you.
KT: In your beautiful book ‘NUDE/A ROOM/ FLOWERS’, you have photographed varied subjects like men, women, flowers, landscape, sky, animals, interior, dairy life with no photographic sequence and no time. It’s like exploring a long-term romantic relationship with your surroundings. What do you want to achieve with your photography in the end?
SN: I appreciate your thoughts on NUDE/ a Room/Flower. It’s a continuation of what I’ve been doing over the years. I shoot everything that changes in front of me.
