Weekend Portfolio: Will Matsuda

Will Matsuda (b. 1993) is a photographer and writer from Portland, Oregon. His work engages with his family, Japanese-American identity, and the natural world. His images and writing have appeared in The New York Times, NPR, Aperture, The Fader, and Topic, among others. He is currently an MFA candidate in the Image Text program at Ithaca College.

“These photographs are grounded in my identity as a Japanese American. I am interested in examining ideas about home, belonging, and performance in relation to my mixed heritage. Formally, I am drawing inspiration from the rich tradition of Japanese woodblock prints. This selection draws from three bodies of work: Hanafuda, Kyoushuu, and an ongoing body of work about my family's relationship to Hawaii.”

“The Japanese word "Kyoushuu" (郷愁) approximately translates to "nostalgia for a home of long ago." A few of the photographs here are from Kyoto, the city where my parents met. I was reading Haruki Murakami’s “The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles” while making them and I think about this quote from the book often: “To know one’s own state is not a simple matter. One cannot look directly at one’s own face with one’s own eyes, for example. One has no choice but to look at one’s reflection in the mirror. Through experience, we come to believe that the image is correct, but that is all.” I consider my work a mirror; I continue to grapple with what is reflected back to me and what is not.”

You can find more of Will’s work here.