The Silent Snows of Hokkaido

I have been for­tu­nate to pho­to­graph many land­scapes in a vari­ety of dif­fer­ent coun­tries through­out the world but the pho­tographs I had seen of Japan always seemed to have a dif­fer­ence that was dif­fi­cult to cat­e­go­rize and I have always been drawn to places that may chal­lenge me as a photographer.

My default posi­tion is to nor­mal­ly head to loca­tions that could be regard­ed as remote, or cer­tain­ly feel that way. As well as feel­ing a long way from cities and towns, the land­scapes I regard as my favourites are ones that appear almost untouched, although in real­i­ty, this is sel­dom the case as almost all of the land­scapes I have expe­ri­enced have been mod­eled and influ­enced by the hands of mankind. One of the main fac­tors that made Japan, and Hokkai­do in par­tic­u­lar, fas­ci­nat­ing was the appar­ent sim­plic­i­ty of the place, cer­tain­ly in the deep win­ter months. One of the approach­es I take as a land­scape pho­tog­ra­ph­er is to dis­till the ele­ments of the land­scape down to under­stand­able parts of a com­po­si­tion so that the pho­to­graph is not an over­whelm­ing record of every aspect of the scene.

Trav­el­ing through coun­tries as pho­to­genic as Scot­land, USA, Nor­way and Ice­land, there is still the need to break down the enor­mi­ty of the land­scape and make pho­tographs that say some­thing about indi­vid­ual aspects of that land­scape that I saw when I was there with my cam­era. The pho­tographs I had seen of Hokkai­do showed less of this process and in fact seemed to describe a land­scape that was ele­men­tal and min­i­mal in its own right with very lit­tle need for dis­til­la­tion at all. I began to won­der if pho­tograph­ing this type of land­scape would be sim­ple, or in fact, the very sim­plic­i­ty itself would be challenging.

The oth­er appeal for me was most of the work I had seen in Hokkai­do that cap­tured my atten­tion was tak­en in the win­ter months. Hokkai­do is a place that is almost guar­an­teed beau­ti­ful win­ter snow, and lots of it, from the months of Octo­ber though to March. It is the very occur­rence ofs­now that puts a veil over the land­scape and masks all but the wood­land and some of the arti­facts of the farm­ing activ­i­ty here that ceas­es com­plete­ly dur­ing the winter.

After some delib­er­a­tion I decid­ed to make the jour­ney to Hokkai­do in ear­ly March and meet a local guide there. First impres­sions are of course very impor­tant and I would be lying if I did not say I was a lit­tle under­whelmed by the place mak­ing my way from the air­port to my first hotel. The first thing that became appar­ent over the next few days was that very lit­tle of the island is what I would regard as remote and the island con­sists of many small towns that are linked by roads that ser­vice vast areas of man­aged farm­land. Equal­ly, the areas at the coast are semi-indus­tri­alised by the vibrant fish­ing indus­try which ranges from mod­ern fish­ing ports to hun­dreds of small fisherman’s hous­es and huts that are occu­pied dur­ing the fish­ing sea­sons in the warmer months of the year

After a day or two I began to set­tle into the envi­ron­ment sur­round­ing meand soon realised that it was my pre­con­cep­tion of what I expect­ed that was hin­der­ing me. Giv­en all of the indus­tri­al instal­la­tions and the man­aged farm­land, the land­scape was stark and cold. I sup­pose that I am so used to ​‘enter­ing’ the land­scape and sens­ing a change from inhab­it­ed farm areas to some­thing that appears pro­tect­ed and pre­served in the for­mof a nation­al park. This of course is very appar­ent in Cana­da and Amer­i­ca where­by you enter the nation­al parks through gat­ed entrances and are made aware that things are about to change around you. Even the UK the land­scape changes as you cross the bor­ders of Scot­land or approach Snow­do­nia, there is a per­ceived pres­ence of beau­ty, but here in Hokkaidoit was the win­ter con­di­tions alone that had an over­whelm­ing impact on the appear­ance of the land­scape and what the snow did not cov­er was to be the sub­ject mat­ter that I found enor­mous­ly abundant.

The sen­sa­tion of remote­ness was made quite appar­ent by the silence of the place with the deep snow and blan­ket­ed white open spaces. It seemed that every­thing was on hold oth­er than the qui­et and slow move­ments of peo­ple to local shops in the towns and vil­lages that we passed through. In con­trast to the beau­ty and pris­tine snow cov­ered land­scape, the vil­lages and towns looked tired and worn-out with snow drifts piled high on the road sides with access to homes and shops cut out of them. Cars and gar­dens were buried in meter deep snow and the only hubs of activ­i­ty were the local gas sta­tions and 7Eleven stores. 

Also at the coast there are hun­dreds of fishermen’s huts lin­ing the roads that con­sist­ed of cor­ru­gat­ed struc­tures sur­round­ed by old rust­ing trucks and machin­ery, seem­ing­ly aban­doned, but all of which will be brought to life when the sea-ice melts away upon the arrival of Spring and the fish­ing sea­son also springs into life.

All of the above added to the ​‘feel’ of the place and how the onset of the win­ter had changed every­thing for the sea­son. My expe­ri­ence of the land­scape was one of mys­tery and, after a lit­tle time, intrigue and excite­ment. The dis­til­la­tion process that I have prac­ticed all of my career was chal­lenged here as much of my sur­round­ings were already blan­ket­ed in white so I wasessen­tial­ly faced with ele­ments that I had not had the plea­sure of see­ing before on such a huge scale. Fur­ther­more,
with my pas­sion for the black and white pho­to­graph which has been with me all of my pho­to­graph­ic career and giv­en the lack of colour oth­er than the blues in the sky, I was begin­ning to quick­ly appre­ci­ate I was in the per­fect land­scape for me.

It is often stat­ed that when con­sid­er­ing black and white com­po­si­tions you must first ​‘see’ the under­ly­ing forms, lines and tex­tures. Along with this we must almost dis­count colours and trade them for weight, bal­ance, lumi­nos­i­ty and tones, which I believe, are the skele­ton of the pho­to­graph, the very things that will hold all of the ele­ments togeth­er. In this land­scape I was work­ing with the skele­tal remains of indus­tri­alised farms and fish­ing. Every­thing was there for me, every note in the musi­cal scale so to speak. The only thing left for me to do was to was to arrange them. One of the things any pho­tog­ra­ph­er will expe­ri­ence in a land­scape such as Hokkai­do is the amount of emp­ty, or neg­a­tive space. It can be rather chal­leng­ing to con­sid­er mak­ing com­po­si­tions that dis­play vir­tu­al­ly noth­ing, white spaces. Cer­tain­ly work­ing in the UK, we are often faced with a sit­u­a­tion of ​‘what to put where’ and how that will fit with­in the four cor­ners of the frame. In Hokkai­do that was quick­ly replaced by ​‘where shall I place it and why?

Besides some of the tru­ly nat­ur­al envi­ron­ments I vis­it­ed in the moun­tain areas, most of the low­lands clear­ly showed signs of mankind. The tree­lines on the edges of fields that act as a form of wind break from the fero­cious winds that come from the sur­round­ing seas. These fas­ci­nat­ed me in their uni­for­mi­ty and, quite unlike nat­ur­al wood­land, the trees seem to stand on guard brave­ly fac­ing the harsh con­di­tions. Trees became a very impor­tant part of what I want­ed to pho­to­graph in Hokkai­do and what I did pho­to­graph in Hokkai­do. I was intrigued how the trees seemed to com­pli­ment the open and neg­a­tive space of the land­scape. They accen­tu­at­ed the rise and fall of the undu­lat­ing farm­land as well as being grouped togeth­er as copses as if in small com­mu­ni­ties on hill­tops. In the moun­tain areas the trees were con­tort­ed and old with some meet­ing their final demise in the cold moun­tain air. I recall vivid­ly one par­tic­u­lar after­noon high up on a moun­tain pass and I saw trees perched high against an ever chang­ing sky that trans­formed from milky blue with wispy clouds to heavy snow laden grey. The rela­tion­ship of the trees and the sky changed con­stant­ly as did the per­son­al­i­ty of the trees and their inter­ac­tions with each other.

It is often stat­ed that when con­sid­er­ing black and white com­po­si­tions you must first ​‘see’ the under­ly­ing forms, lines and tex­tures. Along with this we must almost dis­count colours and trade them for weight, bal­ance, lumi­nos­i­ty and tones, which I believe, are the skele­ton of the pho­to­graph, the very things that will hold all of the ele­ments togeth­er. In this land­scape I was work­ing with the skele­tal remains of indus­tri­alised farms and fish­ing. Every­thing was there for me, every note in the musi­cal scale so to speak. The only thing left for me to do was to was to arrange them. One of the things any pho­tog­ra­ph­er will expe­ri­ence in a land­scape such as Hokkai­do is the amount of emp­ty, or neg­a­tive space. It can be rather chal­leng­ing to con­sid­er mak­ing com­po­si­tions that dis­play vir­tu­al­ly noth­ing, white spaces. Cer­tain­ly work­ing in the UK, we are often faced with a sit­u­a­tion of ​‘what to put where’ and how that will fit with­in the four cor­ners of the frame. In Hokkai­do that was quick­ly replaced by ​‘where shall I place it and why?

Besides some of the tru­ly nat­ur­al envi­ron­ments I vis­it­ed in the moun­tain areas, most of the low­lands clear­ly showed signs of mankind. The tree­lines on the edges of fields that act as a form of wind break from the fero­cious winds that come from the sur­round­ing seas. These fas­ci­nat­ed me in their uni­for­mi­ty and, quite unlike nat­ur­al wood­land, the trees seem to stand on guard brave­ly fac­ing the harsh con­di­tions. Trees became a very impor­tant part of what I want­ed to pho­to­graph in Hokkai­do and what I did pho­to­graph in Hokkai­do. I was intrigued how the trees seemed to com­pli­ment the open and neg­a­tive space of the land­scape. They accen­tu­at­ed the rise and fall of the undu­lat­ing farm­land as well as being grouped togeth­er as copses as if in small com­mu­ni­ties on hill­tops. In the moun­tain areas the trees were con­tort­ed and old with some meet­ing their final demise in the cold moun­tain air. I recall vivid­ly one par­tic­u­lar after­noon high up on a moun­tain pass and I saw trees perched high against an ever chang­ing sky that trans­formed from milky blue with wispy clouds to heavy snow laden grey. The rela­tion­ship of the trees and the sky changed con­stant­ly as did the per­son­al­i­ty of the trees and their inter­ac­tions with each other.

The signs of farm­ing activ­i­ty pre­sent­ed them­selves in many ways from sim­ple fence lines sep­a­rat­ing fields devoid of any­thing oth­er than snow, to green­house struc­tures that had been pre­pared for the win­ter by remov­ing the plas­tic canopies as the weight of the snow would crush the sim­ple tube frames. Some of the farm­steads were lit­er­al­ly sur­round­ed by a sea of white snow. Trav­el­ling across large areas of flat­lands these set­tle­ments could eas­i­ly be iden­ti­fied by, once again, the trees sur­round­ing or close to them. Because of this it became a reg­u­lar occur­rence to see a sim­ple stand of trees amidst the open land­scape that seems out of place but if you saw the same scene dur­ing sum­mer­time it would not look out of place any­where in Europe.

All the time I was in Hokkai­do I was work­ing in a land­scape that was in a sta­t­ic state. The peo­ple there seemed to be almost sit­ting it out and wait­ing for the thaw of spring to arrive. The silence the snow caus­es is quite fas­ci­nat­ing indeed. We have all expe­ri­enced snow at some time and know that it damp­ens down reflect­ed sound, but when the snow is of this mag­ni­tude, noth­ing but the sound of the occa­sion­al pass­ing car and rush of wind will dis­turb your con­cen­tra­tion. At the sea edge the winds can be bit­ter and if there is a snow storm brew­ing, as there often is, then the con­trast of white land­scape and dark clouds above was a reward for me to pho­to­graph. The light and cloud can be tran­sient. One morn­ing I was pho­tograph­ing a beau­ti­ful area of sil­ver birch trees when the cloud sud­den­ly cleared and the result­ing long slen­der shad­ows cast from hun­dreds of trees onto the clean flat snow will be some­thing I will remem­ber for many years to come. The oppo­site set of cir­cum­stances was trav­el­ling into a bliz­zard and notic­ing how any form of harsh­ness or con­trast in the land­scape was mut­ed by the amount of wind car­ried snow. Every­thing was soft and bright and the trees became ghost­ly fig­ures in the dis­tance. It was with­out doubt dif­fi­cult to work in these con­di­tions and some­times head­ing into the field to gain a bet­ter posi­tion meant you found your­self waist deep in soft drift­ing snow.

So what are my thoughts now hav­ing been to Japan in the win­ter and left my own foot­prints behind? I have learned that pre­con­cep­tions of the wider land­scape from pho­tographs are just that, pre­con­cep­tions, and they can be far from real­i­ty. In fact, that is the case for all pho­tog­ra­phy, but in Hokkai­do the beau­ty con­sists of mil­lions of lit­tle facets of the land­scape amidst sur­round­ings that you would not expect. It is cer­tain­ly like no oth­er win­ter land­scape I have pho­tographed before and it was an amaz­ing expe­ri­ence to pho­to­graph in a sin­gle ​‘mode’ for the entire time I was there. What I mean by this is the basic ele­ments of the place remained the same, name­ly the stark and sim­ple ele­ments of the land­scape the win­ter con­di­tions allow you to see for many months of the year. In a way, the dis­til­la­tion is done and you are actu­al­ly left with a land­scape which you have to dis­til fur­ther in the vast open white spaces. Many names or labels can be applied to pho­tographs of Hokkai­do in the win­ter. Call it ​“min­i­mal­ism’ or ​‘sim­plic­i­ty’ but in real­i­ty it does not actu­al­ly fall neat­ly into any cat­e­go­ry. As I men­tioned in the out­come, even my pho­tographs of Hokkai­do, for me, have some­thing that is dif­fer­ent for me. I under­stand they are pic­tures and trees, fences and the coast, but they are in a way graph­i­cal, which is true of the land­scape itself. What I also learned from my time there is that I would nor­mal­ly aim to seek out a land­scape that is as nat­ur­al as pos­si­ble, but I felt I became enveloped and rel­ished in the blend of man-made and nat­ur­al won­ders of the win­ter and the two togeth­er were as excit­ing for me as pho­tograph­ing my first Auro­ra Bore­alis, Yosemite Val­ley and even Glen­coe as a young lad. I learned that even after three decades I can still be shocked and won­der­ful­ly chal­lenged in loca­tions I am not famil­iar with and I for one, hope that Hokkai­do will become more famil­iar when I go back and I con­tin­ue to see the sim­ple and the fas­ci­nat­ing in the depths of its winter.