EXHIBITION

13th November - 8th December 2025

Smoke and SteamKentaro Kumon

When I was a freshman in college, my father passed down his OLYMPUS PEN FT to me.
It was nothing like the camera I dreamed of owning—an old, battered machine so worn-out that the mirror had once been glued back in place.
Yet when he taught me how to use it and I pressed the shutter for the first time, even this shabby camera captured the scene before me with striking clarity.

Titled “Smoke and Steam,” this exhibition presents a large selection of photographs taken throughout 2023 with that very camera, along with carefully chosen new works that have never been shown before, all available for viewing and purchase.
The exhibition features a different composition from the 2024 show at Roll (Iidabashi, Tokyo) and the upcoming one at LAG (Gaienmae) in June 2025.

Twenty-five years have passed since I took that first photograph.
Created with the camera that paved the way for my life in photography, this body of work may be the trace of a quiet pact between a one-of-a-kind father and his one-of-a-kind camera—a journey through which they gently guided me into the future of photography.

“What delighted me most was realizing that the scenes my father once framed through this viewfinder decades ago somehow resemble the ones I frame today.
It felt as though, throughout this year, I might have been borrowing my father’s eyes.”
— Kentaro Kumon (excerpt from the photobook “Smoke and Steam”)



Kentaro Kumon (b. 1981) is a photographer based in Japan.
He works extensively across magazines, books, and advertising, focusing primarily on reportage and portraiture.
Alongside his editorial and commercial work, Kumon pursues long-term projects exploring the relationship between people and nature, particularly in the context of primary industries.

His major works include Tilling the Land, a documentary on agricultural landscapes across Japan; Koyomi-gawa, which examines the connection between rivers and human life; Light Landscapes, a journey through Japanese peninsulas capturing their climate and culture; and NEMURUSHIMA, a project addressing depopulation on the islands of the Seto Inland Sea. His most recent work, Smoke and Steam, is a year-long snapshot series exploring his relationship with his father through a camera inherited from him.

Kumon received the Newcomer Award from the Japan Photographic Society in 2012 for Goma no Yōhinten, and the Society’s Artist Award in 2024.
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