Tokyo Photographic Art Museum

Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa has long been recognised as one of contemporary cinema’s most uncompromising and visionary voices. Emerging in the 1980s, Costa quickly established a distinctive style defined by stark contrasts of light and shadow, rigorously composed frames, and an unflinching gaze at the margins of society. His films, such as In Vanda’s Room (2000), which captured the daily struggles of Cape Verdean immigrants in Lisbon’s Fontainhas district, marry documentary intensity with painterly precision. Acclaimed internationally, Costa’s work has extended beyond the cinema screen to major exhibitions, including ‘Company’ (Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, 2018) and ‘The Song of Pedro Costa’ (Spain, 2022-23). Celebrating its 30th anniversary, the Tokyo Photographic Art Museum presents Costa’s ‘Innervisions’ until December 7. Inspired by Stevie Wonder’s 1973 album of the same name, which profoundly influenced Costa’s youth, the exhibition reflects on the interplay between individual lives and wider social realities. The show introduces characters that play vital roles in the artist’s oeuvre, alongside the environments they inhabit, situating Costa’s cinema within its broader sociohistorical context. Complementing the exhibition, the museum will host Carte Blanche, a film series curated by Costa, together with screenings of his own seminal works. Offering rare insight into the filmmaker’s creative universe, ‘Innervisions’ invites audiences to rediscover the...