Overlook - Photographs by Tomio Seike

World-class seascapes by Tomio Seike

Opening: weekdays from 08:30 – 17:00

Tomio Seike is a Japanese photographer now in his late 60s. He has lived for many years in Europe, in England and in France, and one of his bases has been a flat overlooking the beach at Brighton.

From that viewpoint, Seike has made an astonishing series of beachscapes by literally overlooking sharply downwards.

Although each image has a very clear ‘horizon’, the sky is never seen. As we look at each picture, we are momentarily made to mistake the sea for a sky. It is that pun of sea-or-sky which gives these pictures their life.

On the beach, people perform their little ritual dances with their dogs and with each other, almost ridiculous against the enormities of the sea behind.
These people are frozen by the shutter as much as by the Channel winds.

This is a distance away from the beach as it’s more usually seen. It’s because we know the beach at close range: playground, singles bar, home of the bikini and the ice cream — that it is so moving when seen like this.

Tomio Seike's reputation rests mainly on his lifetime of working in the exquisite monochrome of platinum printing. The Overlook series, no less exquisite, is of delicate pigment prints in lovely subtle registers of colour.

The Dorset Place Gallery is a space of the University of Brighton, completely free and open to all. Brighton residents and visitors are welcome to discover their beach in a way they have never seen it before.

For further enquiries, contact Francis Hodgson.