Noto in the News

Bill Tingey, British Photographer, celebrates the charm of the Noto Peninsula

Bill Tingey, who was based in Wajima (on the Noto peninsula, Japan) for a month this year to photograph and report on the culture and natural beauty of the peninsula, is having an exhibition at a gallery in the UK under the title Glimpses of Japan, stating Saturday 7th November.

A number of the photographs are of some of the most attractive aspects of the countryside and coast of the peninsula and through these images, Bill hopes visitors to the exhibition will begin to recognise just what an enchanting place it is.

The exhibition is being held in Hay-on-Wye, the well-know secondhand book town on the borders of Wales and will be on until 21st November.

Bill spent a month travelling around the peninsula visiting many locations and individuals, researching various aspects of traditional culture as well as seeing some of the beautiful scenery of the peninsula and he says he became completely take with the beauty of Noto and the warmth of its people.

Bill says that he wanted to do something to encourage people to take more notice of this wonderful area and decided to have a photographic exhibition to show off the pastoral scenery and the true lacquarework, for which Wajima is famous.  The exhibition also includes some of the photographs Bill took in Kyoto last year when he was there capturing some of the iconographical scenes, so indicative of the beauty of Japan.

Bill lived in Japan for 24 years from 1976 and worked as a photographer and translator based in Tokyo.  He was invited to come to Noto in June by the body that was set up with the aim of fostering redevelopment in the area that became necessary after the earthquake which occurred in 2007.  Coinciding with the opening of the new Shinkansen high speed express route From Tokyo to Kanazawa, the prefectural capital, Bill was asked to come to Noto in order to gather material so that he could write a blog in English—from Noto—that would perhaps encourage more foreign visitors to come to the Noto Peninsula and would generally make people abroad more aware of its attributes.

Bill made a point of showing a map of the peninsula to visitors to the exhibition Private View held on 6th November.  He was anxious to promote the charms of the peninsula through both the exhibition and the blog.

Photo:  Bill is seen here explaining one of his photographs of the Noto countryside to a visitor at the Private View at the gallery in Hay-on-Wye.

Article by Hiroyuki Kitayama published in the Hokkoku Newspaper on 8th November 2015