Maquettes / Light #0426

In the series Maquettes/Light (1994-1997), Hatakeyama observed patterns in the lights emanating from apartment buildings and other structures populating the city while wandering the streets of Tokyo at night. Initially printing the images in black and white on photo paper, he affixes a transparent film of the same image onto the back of the paper, and finally mounts the paper and film together onto a lightbox. Mimicking the type of light (i.e., fluorescent light) often affixed to an exterior hallway ceiling of an apartment building, the light boxes recreate their illumination and architectural presence. Hatakeyama approached the individual structures in this series as if they were models of actual buildings, manipulating their scale and presentation. This series signals his early interest in scaled models and miniatures, which Hatakeyama would later photograph extensively.