Takami Akai First Photography Exhibition in Tokyo

06.04.2009 by Adrian A. Lozano

Takami Akai co-founder of Gainax exhibited a collection of his personal photographs in Tokyo for the first time this week. The exhibition ran for six days ending on April 6th 2009 and featured over 100 color photographs. We had no idea this event was going on and luckily we ran across a listing of this event on Tokyo Art Beat the night before it ended.







The event was in Yoyogi held by Gallery Kirari which is about a 10-minute walk from Shinjuku station. The exhibition was free for the entire six day run, and upon walking inside the venue I noticed Akai sitting in the room on his laptop. He was a very attentive and polite host, and he took time to explain his photos and talk about his work in the anime industry. The theme of his exhibit was "Uncommon and or unintentionally humors daily life photos". Every photo had a hand written caption to go with it, each one added to the humor in the picture. Many of the photos were of cats and dogs Akai said, "I like cats and dogs the same. I have a cat because owning a dog requires more attention where cats are more independent".



Photography is Akai's hobby and over the past few years he has taken photos in Japan as well as Germany, South Korea and San Francisco. One photo was taken in front of UDX in Akihabara so we asked him if he goes there often and what he thought about maid cafes. He says, "I go to Akihabara some times. I don't like maid cafes at all, well maybe just a little. I do enjoy Schatzkiste and have been there a few times." The photos of San Francisco were taken during his visit to Fanimecon in 2002; he hopes to return to the fan run convention in the near future.


Akai enjoys taking photos with both film and digital cameras; twelve of his cameras used for the exhibited photos were also showcased for visitors to handle freely. He has no preference over either media though he says digital is very convenient. Two of his favorite cameras from his collection are his Nikon D700 and Kiev-10. The Kiev-10 is an antique Soviet camera and Akai say that it reminds him of a robot, I would have to say it does look like the head of King Joe from Ultraseven.



Even though the exhibit had no connection to anime other than Akai's professional profile some elements of it still managed to find it's way in front of the camera. Akai is currently working on a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann PC game and preparing for a new animation project.