Naoki Honjo’s Small World

Naoki Honjo’s work is instantly recognisable; however, what he captures on film can be difficult to decipher. Characterised by its diorama style, the scenes depicted in his series Small Planet look more like model villages than landscapes that one might be able to explore in reality. These optical illusions are in fact all in the method; shot from skyscrapers, helicopters, or towers using a shift-tilt lens, the photographer shrinks his vista, toying with our notion of perception. 

Born in Tokyo in 1978, Naoki Honjo studied at Tokyo Polytechnic University, graduating with a BA from the photography department and an MA from the media department. His work is part of institutional collections at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas, and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. In 2006, he was awarded the Kimura Ihei Award for his publication Small Planet, often credited as the body of work that established both his reputation and his unique photographic technique.

Dream-like distance

Across the series can be found city intersections where people appear as small as ants, the Tokyo Tower looking like a LEGO toy, or a swimming pool appearing as if it belongs to a doll’s house. Incredibly, Naoki Honjo’s work is not digitally manipulated; instead, he has superhuman patience, waiting, according to one gallerist interviewed by Artnet, for two days to achieve the perfect shot. 

Naoki Honjo has continued to document an ever-shifting city with his 2016 series Tokyo, which focuses on the breakneck speed of development in the lead up to the Olympic Games. Taken from a dream-like distance, Naoki Honjo ossifies a constantly-mutating city in mid-flight. 

Small Planet (2006), a photo book by Naoki Honjo, is published by Little More Japan.