Tomohide Ikeya (b. 1974, Kanagawa, Japan) is an artist and photographer whose work examines the human desire for control and the relationship between life and death. Through encounters with water, the body, and the natural environment, he explores the tension between resistance and surrender, domination and coexistence. His practice encompasses underwater photography and works incorporating materials that connect images to physical transformation and the memory of place. His series include BREATH, WAVE, MOON, OCEAN, and LIMBO.
Artist’s Statement
My work begins with the desire for control. We seek to shape our surroundings, direct our bodies, and hold on to what matters to us. Yet the life we try to preserve depends on forces we cannot command. I work within this contradiction, asking where control sustains us, where it becomes domination, and how we might live with what remains beyond our reach.
Before becoming a photographer, I worked as a chef. Preparing plants and animals as food made the relationship between life and death tangible: to live is also to participate in the deaths of others. This experience continues to shape my work. Life and death are not separate subjects for me, but conditions that give meaning to one another.
Water gives these questions a physical form. It sustains us, yet beneath its surface we cannot breathe. When I photograph underwater, I hold my breath alongside my subjects. Preparation and technique meet movements neither of us can fully direct. Resistance and surrender coexist in the body; neither alone describes its attachment to life.
These tensions extend beyond the photographed moment. I work with plaster, glass, charred wood, and sand gathered at the places I photograph. Their surfaces bring the image into contact with material change and the memory of a place. In OCEAN, removing visible human-made objects from a seascape does not restore a nature untouched by us. The attempt to erase our presence instead raises the question of how deeply we are already implicated in what we see.
Across my work, I return to the unstable boundary between ourselves and what we call nature. We belong to it even as we try to stand apart from it. I do not seek to resolve this tension, but to give it a form in which vulnerability and strength, destruction and creation, life and death can be encountered together.
Biography
Tomohide Ikeya (b. 1974, Kanagawa, Japan) is an artist and photographer whose practice examines the human desire for control and the inseparability of life and death. Working with water, the body, and photographic materials, he considers the tension between our dependence on nature and our attempts to dominate it.
Before becoming a photographer, Ikeya worked as a chef. Preparing plants and animals as food brought him into daily contact with the reality that one life is sustained by the deaths of others. This experience, together with his encounter with scuba diving, became foundational to his artistic practice.
In his underwater photography, Ikeya holds his breath alongside his subjects. Careful preparation meets movements that neither photographer nor subject can fully direct. His series BREATH, WAVE, and MOON approach the body through breathing, resistance, surrender, and the rhythms of the natural world. His wider practice includes OCEAN and LIMBO, extending his inquiry through different subjects and materials. Plaster, glass, charred wood, sand, acrylic, and hemp washi bring the photographic image into relation with physical surfaces, transformation, and memory.
Ikeya studied at Tokyo College of Photography from 2000 to 2001 and began his independent career in 2002. His work has been presented at venues including Micheko Galerie, Munich; Vanilla Gallery, Tokyo; and Toyama Glass Art Museum.
Alongside his artistic and commercial photography, he maintains a teaching practice. He was a part-time lecturer at Tokyo College of Photography from 2012 to 2022 and has taught part-time at Nippon Photography Institute since 2022.
Education
2000–2001 Tokyo College of Photography
2000–2001 Tokyo College of Photography
Teaching
2012–2022 Tokyo College of Photography — Part-time Lecturer
2022– Nippon Photography Institute — Part-time Lecturer
2012–2022 Tokyo College of Photography — Part-time Lecturer
2022– Nippon Photography Institute — Part-time Lecturer
2019 “MOON” Vanilla Gallery(Tokyo)
2018 “BREATH” Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2016 "WAVE" Gallery Kogure (NY)
2018 “BREATH” Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2016 "WAVE" Gallery Kogure (NY)
2015 "BREATH" Soiz Galerie (Passau)
2013 “BREATH” Alternative Space in SEIBU Shibuya (Tokyo)
2012 “BREATH”&”MOON” Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2010 “BREATH” Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2010 “BREATH” LOWER AKIHABARA.(Tokyo)
2024 “PHOTO LONDON" Somerset House(London)
2024 "THE ART HOUSE" Exhibition MYNAVI ART SQUARE(Tokyo)
2024 "THE ART HOUSE" Exhibition MYNAVI ART SQUARE(Tokyo)
2023 "icon contemporary Photography 2023" AXIS Gallery(Tokyo)
2022 "icon contemporary Photography" AXIS Gallery(Tokyo)
2020 "Paradise Lost" Vanilla Gallery(Tokyo)
2019 ”Japanese Nudes” Japanmuseum SieboldHuis (Leiden)
2018 “Jin-Zo” Emon Gallery (Tokyo)
2018 “FINE LINE” sansiao Gallery HK(HongKong)
2017 "Waves and Emotions" Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2017 “GOTH II - Conception” Vanilla Gallery(Tokyo)
2015 “DROPS” H.P.FRANCE WINDOW GALLERY MARUNOUCHI（Tokyo）
2018 “Jin-Zo” Emon Gallery (Tokyo)
2018 “FINE LINE” sansiao Gallery HK(HongKong)
2017 "Waves and Emotions" Micheko Galerie (Munich)
2017 “GOTH II - Conception” Vanilla Gallery(Tokyo)
2015 “DROPS” H.P.FRANCE WINDOW GALLERY MARUNOUCHI（Tokyo）
Awards
Moscow International Foto Awards 2014 Bronze in a Book - Fine Art for “BREATH”
International Photography Awards 2012 2nd place in People (other) for "MOON”
PX3 PRIX DE LA PHOTOGRAPHIE PARIS 2010 2nd place in Fine art (nudes) for "BREATH"
Xto image award 2010 1st place in Body in Nature for “BREATH”
International Photography Awards 2009 2nd place in Special (moving images) for "BREATH”
International Photography Awards 2009 1st place in People (other) for "BREATH”
International Photography Awards 2007 1st place for "WAVE”
