Huis Marseille, Museum for Photography in Amsterdam is currently hosting a major retrospective of Kusukazu Uraguchi's work, featuring his celebrated series "Shima no Ama." The exhibition, which runs through February 8, 2026, showcases eighty black-and-white photographs selected from the Japanese photographer's extensive archive. Uraguchi, who lived from 1922 to 1988, dedicated more than three decades of his career to documenting the ama, an extraordinary community of female divers and fisherwomen from Japan's Shima region where he was born. His powerful visual testimony captures a traditional vocation that has been steadily declining in modern times. The collection made its debut at the 2024 Rencontres d'Arles international photography festival and has been enhanced for its Amsterdam presentation with additional photographs, a newly compiled video piece, and restored vintage wooden display panels.

The ama, which translates to "women of the sea," have inhabited the coastal areas of Shima for over three thousand years, practicing the remarkable art of freediving to harvest seaweed and abalone. These marine mollusks are considered a highly prized delicacy in Japanese cuisine. The ama's unique position in Japanese cultural imagination, combined with their sensual connection to the ocean and their renowned fearlessness and independence, has inspired countless poets and artists throughout the centuries. Uraguchi, being a native of Shima in Mie Prefecture along the Pacific coast, possessed an intimate understanding of this community that allowed him to document their lives with exceptional depth and sensitivity over his thirty-year project.

Uraguchi's photographic approach captured the full spectrum of ama life, from dangerous deep-sea dives to shoreline harvests, intimate portraits, and communal scenes on the beach. He also documented their activities in the amagoya, which are exclusively female enclaves where the divers rest and socialize, as well as their daily Shinto religious practices that culminate in colorful summer matsuri festivals. His images reveal both the ancient traditions of these remarkable women and their vibrant energy in contemporary moments. Inspired by their vitality and the trust they placed in him, Uraguchi developed an intense and expressive photographic style characterized by dramatic black-and-white contrasts, unusual framing, and spontaneous gestures that anchor the ama firmly in their time period, particularly between 1960 and 1980, while celebrating their strong and assertive femininity.

The technical challenges of underwater photography in the 1960s were considerable, yet Uraguchi mastered them using revolutionary equipment. For his underwater images, he employed the Nikonos camera, which Nikon introduced in 1963 specifically for subaquatic photography. Uraguchi purchased one immediately and began using it in 1965 to document the solitary underwater hunts of the ama. While he likely lacked the physical capability to dive alongside the most experienced ama—known as funado, who wore weighted belts and descended to depths of 18 to 30 meters while holding their breath for up to two minutes—he accompanied the kachido (those who walk from shore) and okedo (those who carry buckets in the water). These divers typically descended to about ten meters, facing numerous hazards including pressure risks to lungs and ears, tangled seaweed forests, and narrow caves where abalone sought shelter.

The exhibition's foundation is Uraguchi's remarkable archive, which contains tens of thousands of negatives that remained unexamined following his death in 1988. The rediscovery of this material is credited to curator Sonia Voss, who initiated the archival research and organized the original Arles exhibition. Voss, born in 1978 and based in Paris and Berlin, also serves as guest curator for the Amsterdam presentation. During his lifetime, Uraguchi frequently displayed his prints on vintage wooden panels in two standard formats, mounted on bases crafted by a Shima artisan. Thanks to the photographer's son, several original panels have been preserved, and six are featured at Huis Marseille, including three recently restored pieces never before shown in Europe.

The Arles exhibition was accompanied by a publication titled "Shima no Ama," which is being reprinted specially for the Amsterdam show. Published by Atelier EXB in both English and French editions, the hardcover book measures 22 by 28 centimeters and contains 168 pages with 119 black-and-white photographs. It includes texts by visual anthropologist Chihiro Minato and curator Sonia Voss, with editorial direction by Voss. The book retails for 49 euros and provides comprehensive context for understanding Uraguchi's significant contribution to both documentary photography and the preservation of Japan's intangible cultural heritage. The exhibition is produced by Les Rencontres d'Arles and represents a crucial opportunity for international audiences to engage with this previously overlooked master of Japanese amateur photography.