Miyuki Okuyama, At Dusk, 2022

Dusk, the transitional hour bridging day and night, symbolizes the border between conscious and unconscious, light and dark or life and death.

Further, in ancient Japanese culture, dusk was considered to be the time when one might encounter dark creatures. The images of “At Dusk” are to visualize inner reality of a person who has been through change in her life, moving from one culture to another.

While it is a personal project, it has a possibility to be collective, triggering similar evocative effects in a viewer’s mind. The images exist somewhere between reality and fantasy, and those often somber images are inspired by the fragmented memories of my childhood, long discarded fears and vaguely recalled nightmares.