"There are artists whose large-format images or 'strong' subject matter strike us like an arrow, straight to the eyes, in the sole aim of making us breathe in the acrid stench of our time. Masao Yamamoto is not one of them; he stands rather at the antipodes to them. His photographs do not even reach us easily: we have to go out of ourselves to meet them; and, because of their small format, we have to get up close to them, as if putting our eye to a keyhole, In contrast to the violent or spectacular nature of many contemporary images, Yamamoto offers softness and subtlety, which is not to say blandness or conformity of any kid; his softness is like that of a mist that envelopes the landscape and transmutes it."