Selected work / Functional camera-based apparatus
Eye to Eye 2024
A working camera with a separate imaging lens and an opening that keeps the photographer’s eye visible.
- Medium
- Functional camera-based apparatus
- Materials
- ABS resin, aluminum, polycarbonate
- Dimensions
- W138 × H80 × D50 mm
Looking through an opening
Eye to Eye is a functioning, screenless camera with an opening passing through its body. The opening occupies the prominent central position where a lens is usually expected; a separate, smaller lens records photographs. Hold the camera to the eye and the photographer can remain visible to the person in front of it. The structure allows looking and being looked at to take place together.
From a viewfinder to a passage
Matsuura connects this decision to his earlier design work on IVY REC, known in Japan as iNSPiC REC, a screenless camera whose clip also serves as an open viewfinder. Eye to Eye develops the concern in a different direction. The passage continues through the camera body, bringing the person behind the apparatus into the exchange. A viewing structure becomes a decision about who is visible to whom.
The encounter around the photograph
The photograph remains part of the work, but attention also falls on the encounter in which it is made. Before the image becomes a record, two people share a situation organised by the camera. Eye to Eye asks how the design of that apparatus can alter the relationship between photographer and subject, and which parts of their meeting remain outside the finished image.