Masahisa Fukase

Koko Yamagashi, circa 2005

Robert Mann Gallery, New York

Translating literally to ‘bubbling’, Masahisa Fukase’s Bukubuku series comprises self-portraits made in his bathtub over the course of a year using a waterproof camera. Bukubuku was the last series Fukase produced prior to suffering a debilitating fall in 1992, which left him incapacitated and unable to work for the rest of his life. 

Bukubuku incorporates performance, melodrama, surrealism, and humor. In the years leading up to his accident, Fukase had become increasingly introspective, and consistently refused to compromise the performative and theatrical element of his work. Of his Bukubuku series, he wrote: “Sometimes I feel that the photographs would be better without my face in them, but I am unable to stop myself putting ‘me’ into the photograph.”