Gresonti Photography
Mount Fuji rising above the clouds

Japan – 日本

Japan through my eyes

Temples and skyscrapers, silence and neon lights: the Japan I have travelled through and keep telling.

«There are places you visit, and places where you somehow feel you belong. For me, Japan is one of them.»

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Tokyo 東京  ·  Kamakura 鎌倉  ·  Kyoto 京都  ·  Nara 奈良  ·  Osaka 大阪 Beyond the image

Tokyo

Tokyo is a city of contrasts, where the future sits naturally alongside the past. Illuminated skyscrapers, neon signs and neighbourhoods that never sleep alternate with small temples and quiet alleys where time seems to slow down. A city that changes its face with every district and every hour, and cannot be understood at a single glance.

東京は、未来と過去が自然に共存する、コントラストに満ちた街です。光り輝く高層ビルやネオンの街並み、眠らない繁華街のすぐそばに、小さな寺院や時間がゆっくりと流れる静かな路地が残されています。訪れる場所や時間によって表情を変え、一度のまなざしでは捉えきれない街です。

Tokyo Station lit up at night, with skyscrapers behind
Asakusa’s Kaminarimon gate lit up at night
A building covered in colourful signs
Tokyo at night from above, a sea of lights
Tokyo Tower at the end of an avenue of winter lights
The tiers of a pagoda lit up at night
Mount Fuji rising above the clouds
An octagonal temple on a reed pond
A station platform among buildings and signs
The illuminated Tokyo Skytree seen from below
A temple approach at night, past closed stalls
The red roofs of a temple against the sky
A red metro train crossing a bridge over a canal
Asakusa at night from above, with the pagoda and temple lit up
A skyscraper lit up at night, seen from below
Tokyo Tower lit up above the city at night

Kamakura

Facing the ocean and surrounded by green hills, Kamakura is where ancient Japan lives on in the present. Once the seat of the shogunate, it is home to temples, shrines and quiet gardens, from the Great Buddha of Kōtoku-in to small streets full of everyday life. A city to walk through slowly, where every corner is a small story waiting to be told.

海に面し、緑の丘に囲まれた鎌倉は、古き日本の面影が今も息づく街です。かつて幕府が置かれたこの地には、高徳院の大仏をはじめ、寺院や神社、静かな庭園、日常の風景が広がる小さな通りが残されています。ゆっくりと歩けば、街角のひとつひとつが小さな物語を語りかけてくれます。

The Great Buddha of Kōtoku-in in Kamakura
A small train with Mount Fuji in the background
A stone staircase with a torii and lanterns
A hand-painted ema votive plaque
A temple gate with a large pine and a red lantern
The front of a train with the Kamakura sign
An old building in traditional style
A visitor in front of a red shrine
Rows of small stone jizō statues
The face of a great Buddha statue among the greenery
The driver at the controls of a small train
Small monk statues in the moss of a garden
Traditional temple roofs on a street in Kamakura
A red torii at the top of a staircase between houses
A small train passing a level crossing

Kyoto

Kyoto is a city where the memory of ancient Japan rises from every street, garden and building. The former imperial capital is home to temples, shrines, Zen gardens and traditional houses, and reveals its beauty in the details: light through the trees, the silence of a garden, the worn wood of an old machiya. A place that invites contemplation.

京都は、古き日本の記憶が街角や庭園、建築の中に息づく街です。かつての都には寺院や神社、禅庭園、伝統的な町家が今も残され、その美しさは木々の間から差し込む光や庭の静けさ、年月を重ねた町家の木の風合いといった細部に宿っています。静かに見つめたくなる場所です。

The tunnel of orange torii at Fushimi Inari
Kyoto’s Golden Pavilion reflected in the pond among autumn colours
A couple in kimono in the bamboo forest
A temple pavilion framed by pine branches
The Phoenix Hall of Byōdō-in reflected in the pond
The main gate of Fushimi Inari shrine
A level crossing on a neighbourhood street
A canal lined with traditional wooden houses
A bamboo forest seen from the ground up
A dark statue in front of ema votive plaques
A row of orange torii at Fushimi Inari
A fox statue with a red bib at Fushimi Inari

Nara

Nara is a place where nature, spirituality and history meet in a timeless atmosphere. Once the capital of Japan, it is home to monumental temples and shrines surrounded by greenery, while its famous deer wander freely among visitors and ancient buildings, leaving the landscape suspended between reality and poetry. Here everything invites you to slow down: your pace, your gaze, your thoughts.

奈良は、自然と精神文化、そして歴史が、時を超えた穏やかな雰囲気の中で交わる場所です。かつての都には壮大な寺院や緑に包まれた神社が残り、自由に歩く鹿たちが風景に詩的な趣を添えています。ここでは、歩みも、まなざしも、心も、自然とゆっくりになります。

The great Nandaimon gate of Tōdai-ji
The great hall of Tōdai-ji in Nara
The Great Buddha of Tōdai-ji
A corridor of red columns in a shrine
A jizō statue with a red cap and bib
A deer among the trees in front of a temple
A large orange torii along a tree-lined path
Small golden Buddhas in the halo of a statue
Gold-decorated tiles along the edge of a roof
A wooden guardian statue inside the temple
Small stone statues with red bibs
The wooden front of an ancient temple
A bronze detail of a votive lantern

Osaka

Osaka tells its story through its streets, its flavours and the people who bring it to life. Lively, spontaneous and full of character, it has an energy unlike any other big Japanese city: the bright signs of Dōtonbori, the popular markets, the small restaurants and the historic neighbourhoods reveal an authentic, deeply human face, where tradition meets modernity without losing its identity.

大阪は、街並みや食文化、そこに暮らす人々の姿を通して魅力を伝えてくれる街です。活気にあふれ、飾らない個性を持つこの街には、ほかの大都市とは違うエネルギーが流れています。道頓堀の看板、市場、小さな飲食店、歴史ある街並み。伝統と現代が交わりながらも、大阪は自分らしさを失いません。

The signs of Dōtonbori reflected in the canal
A pond garden with a skyscraper in the background
A cook making takoyaki at the counter
The red arched bridge of Sumiyoshi Taisha
Tsūtenkaku lit up at the end of a street in Shinsekai
A shopping street covered in signs
Osaka Castle lit up beyond a bridge
Colourful signs with a giant octopus
A skyscraper seen from below beyond a walkway
An alley at night among signs and lanterns
A crowd in a shopping arcade full of signs
The colourful signs of Dotonbori, Osaka
Tsūtenkaku at the end of a street among power lines
A restaurant with a façade covered in lanterns
Osaka Castle lit up at night
Signs with an octopus and lanterns along a street
An illuminated sign with a smiling face
The colourful front of a fugu restaurant

Beyond the image

There are places you visit, and places where you somehow feel you belong. For me, Japan is one of them. Its appeal goes far beyond its landscapes, its temples or its big cities: it comes from the whole of its culture, its history and that particular way of living everyday life that never fails to surprise me. And every time I go back, I feel there is still so much to discover: streets to get lost in, people to watch, details to photograph.

But loving a country does not mean looking at it through an only positive lens. Alongside the beauty of its traditions, Japan also holds contradictions that it would be naive to ignore: the difficulty of social relationships, mistrust towards those seen as foreigners, intense pressure at work and painful pages of its history. I do not mean to judge them with a superficial eye, but neither do I want to hide them behind the idealised image so often given of Japan.

Photography is my way of getting closer to this reality. I like to look for details and fragments of life, away from the pictures people expect to find, so that even those who have never been to Japan can discover a little more of it and see it with different eyes.

Alongside photography there is the study of the Japanese language: not just a tool to communicate, but a doorway to a different way of expressing oneself, of thinking and of relating to others. Being able to talk to people in their own language and come closer to their everyday life is an experience I want to keep living.

This space gathers some of the images from my travels, but above all it tells a part of me: a curiosity that never runs out and the wish to return, again and again.

訪れる場所の中には、ただ旅をする場所もあれば、どこか自分の心の一部がそこにあるように感じる場所もあります。私にとって、日本はそのような場所の一つです。

日本の魅力は、美しい風景や寺院、そして大都市だけにとどまりません。その文化や歴史、そして日常の暮らしの中にある独特の価値観や生活のあり方が重なり合い、訪れるたびに新しい驚きを与えてくれます。そして、日本に戻るたびに、まだまだ知らないことがたくさんあると感じます。歩いてみたい街角、眺めていたい人々、写真に収めたい何気ない風景が、まだ数えきれないほどあります。

しかし、ある国を愛するということは、良い面だけを見ることではありません。美しい伝統の一方で、日本には見過ごすことのできない矛盾も存在します。人と人との関係の難しさ、外国人と見なされる人々に対する警戒心、厳しい労働環境、そして歴史に刻まれた痛ましい出来事などです。表面的な視点から判断するつもりはありませんが、世間で描かれる理想化された日本のイメージの陰に、そうした現実を隠してしまいたくもありません。

写真は、私にとって日本の現実に近づくための一つの方法です。誰もが期待するような風景だけではなく、何気ない細部や人々の暮らしの一瞬を見つけることが好きです。日本を訪れたことのない人にも、この国について新しい何かを発見し、違った視点から見つめてもらえたらと思っています。

写真とともに、日本語の勉強も続けています。日本語は単なるコミュニケーションの手段ではなく、異なる表現や考え方、人との関わり方を知るための入り口でもあります。日本語で人々と会話し、その日常に少しでも近づくことは、これからも大切にしていきたい経験です。

このページには、旅の中で撮影した写真を掲載しています。しかし、それは単なる旅の記録ではなく、私自身の一部でもあります。尽きることのない好奇心と、何度でも日本に戻りたいという想いを込めています。

«To love a place also means wanting to know it for what it is, not only for what we would like it to be.»

「ある場所を愛するということは、理想の姿だけを見るのではなく、ありのままの姿を知ろうとすることでもある。」