They were known as the "girlie photographers," dozens of young female photographers who elbowed their way through the society of cameramen to rise to prominence in Japan during the early 1990s. And as the media loves an underdog, critics loved so-called onnanoko shashinka.
Part of the charm of the "girlie photographers" work was the way their low-tech, often out-of-focus pictures peeked into the everyday lives of the photographers themselves -- a sort of snapshot aesthetic. This approach has evolved as many of the girls have entered their late 20s and early 30s, and an indication of where the trend will go from here is provided by a new exhibition of work by Keiko Nomura, now at the Parco Gallery in Tokyo's Shibuya.
In "Deep South," Nomura, 29, turns her lenses on Okinawa and comes up with a lush and evocative look at Japan's southernmost prefecture. Many of the color photographs focus on the daily lives of the residents of the string of islands, whom Kobe-born Nomura describes as easy to approach, friendly and cooperative.