Street Photography in Gion Kobu in the Early 21st Century
My First Months in Gion
This photo of the maiko Mameshino was one of the first decent images I made in Gion Kobu, way back in April 2003. It is photograph 47 in my first book, One Hundred Views of Maiko and Geiko, which was published in 2006 and is now out of print..
It is a perfect example of the expression, “It’s better to be lucky than good.”
I first started going to Gion Kobu to photograph maiko and geiko late in 2002. I knew literally nothing about them, so I started going at night, from about 7:00 - 9:00 p.m.
The good news was that I was the only photographer (and usually only person) on the streets of Gion at this time, except customers coming and going from restaurants, bars, and tea houses.
The bad news was that I rarely saw a geiko or maiko, and when I did the streets were usually so dark that I couldn’t make a good photograph because the light was so weak.
So, early in 2003, I started going to Gion Kobu in the afternoon once or twice a week. Again there was good news and bad news.
The good news was that there was plenty of light to make a good photograph, at least on the streets that ran east-west. The narrower side streets going north-south were still quite dark, even in broad daylight.
The bad news was that I was definitely not the only person on the streets. There were often tourists, but they usually kept to Hanami-koji, the main street running through Gion,
There was also a group of about 6 photographers I would often see, sometimes together, sometimes separately. They were mostly Japanese men in their sixties, although one was probably younger.
I didn’t even know where geiko and maiko lived or worked at this point, so I would walk around Gion hoping to see one. I rarely did, at least on the same street as me. I would always see them one or two streets away.
As I walked around, I would notice these Japanese photographers, usually talking together on a side street near Ichiriki, the most famous tea house in Gion on the corner of Shijo and Hanami-koji.
Not wanting to step on anyone’s toes, I kept my distance. If I saw them in a certain area, I would move away.
I learned that I would almost never see a maiko or geiko after 6:00 p.m., so I would leave Gion a little after six to go have dinner.
Robert, The Mystery Man
On one of these occasions, one of the Japanese photographers I had noticed came over to me. To my surprise, he introduced himself in English, and he even told me I could call him Robert. He said this was the name that American G.I.s had given him many years ago.
Robert was always nicely dressed, usually in khaki pants, a button-down shirt, and a windbreaker. He had a point-and-shoot camera around his neck, and he walked with a slight limp. His grayish-white hair was cut very short, almost a crew cut, and I guessed he was in in late sixties or possibly a bit older. He seemed like a nice guy.
Almost every time I went to Gion after that, Robert would seek me out. One of the next times I saw him, he showed me his photographs, in a plastic album that photo shops (yes, such places still existed in 2003) gave out when you had your photos developed.
I was already confused as to what Robert was doing in Gion. I had a Nikon F100, a good film slr at the time, and my only lens was the Nikon 50mm f1.4D, a fast lens that didn’t need much light. I had pretty good gear, and I was still having trouble making good photographs.
Robert only had a point-and-shoot film camera. I didn’t see how it was possible to photograph the quick-moving maiko and geiko with a point-and-shoot.
When Robert showed me his photos, I became even more confused. They were often out of focus, and if there was a maiko or geiko in the photo, there would be only part of her, or she would be obscured by the heads of tourists, who were walking between Robert and the maiko or geiko he was following.
Robert was becoming a mystery to me. Whenever I came to Gion, he and the other photographers I saw were always there, so I concluded they came pretty much every day of the week. I couldn’t figure out why.
As the weeks and months went by, I started having more success, both in my developing my photography skills and with cultivating small connections with maiko and geiko, some of who would actually greet me and even talk to me a little by this time.
“Nobody knows why.”
And this was when the problems started.
Street photography is hard. Really hard. You have to be in synch with the people you are trying to photograph, which takes good timing. To have good timing, you need focus and concentration.
Robert would often come up to me to talk at the worst possible times, like just before 6:00 p.m., the best time to see a maiko or geiko as they went to their first engagement of the evening.
I started to miss opportunities to make a photograph because Robert would be standing between me and a maiko or geiko. And he didn’t seem to even notice that there was a maiko or geiko going by!
Why was he coming to Gion to photograph if he wasn’t even paying attention when a maiko rushed by? Sometimes I only saw one maiko the whole day, and on rare occasions I saw none at all. These were precious chances, and I was losing them.
Then, one day, Robert came up to me. He said, “Everyone is envious of you. Maiko and geiko will stop for you, but they won’t stop for anyone else. Nobody knows why.”
Good afternoon to you, too!
I was dumbfounded. I was successful? Were they serious? I was just barely starting to make so-so photos, and when I did make what I thought was a pretty good photo like the one of Mameshino posted here, it was due to luck, not skill.
And if none of them knew why a maiko or geiko would very occasionally stop for me, especially this early in my time in Gion Kobu, I didn’t either. Even now, almost 20 years later, I don’t have a definite answer.
I once asked Yukako and Makiko this same question, and Makiko told me that I never pushed them or pressured them to stop for me, and that is true. I never did. In fact, I would do the opposite. I remember a few times telling a maiko or geiko, “Hello, I photographed you the last time I saw you, so I’m not going to photograph you today. I don’t want to bother you.”
Sometimes I was ignored when I said this, and sometimes a geiko would look at me like I was from Mars. She wouldn’t speak, but she would nod her head slightly in acknowledgment.
They heard me.
And more importantly, by my actions, I showed that I kept my word.
I tried to keep my kind-of friendship with Robert going, but it was hard.
By this time, I had my favorite spot in Gion, which is diagonally across the street from the tea house where I still photograph all these years later. I liked this spot for many reasons, but one of them was that no one else ever came to this area unless a taxi pulled up in front of the Masuume tea house.
The week after Robert’s revelation, he and all his photographer friends decided that they were going to join me at my favorite spot. (Usually, they stayed on Hanami-koji.) So, instead of being alone, I was surrounded by 6 or 7 other photographers. All of them except Robert pretended that I wasn’t there.
It is still one of the most bizarre moments I have ever experienced, being surrounded by people who were standing there because of me but were pretending that I didn’t exist. I was Foster, the friendly ghost!
I didn’t know much at the time, but I did know that no maiko or geiko would stop for me if I was in the middle of a crowd of photographers. I was not happy about it, but I had to give up my favorite spot for a time.
In fact, this encounter made me conclude that I wouldn’t be able to photograph successfully in Gion Kobu alone, so I decided to go in search of a place called Miyagawa-cho.
In June of 2003, 2 months after I made this photo of Mameshino, I found Miyagawa-cho, and it was like heaven for many reasons. One of them was because I was almost always the only photographer there! If you are interested, I wrote about my First Day in Miyagawa-cho here.
I last saw Robert at Yukako’s erikae in 2008. His hair was whiter and his limp was more pronounced, but he still had his point-and-shoot camera.
We chatted as we used to, on a side street near Ichiriki.