Born in Tokyo, Fumio Tanai received a degree in Photography from Tokyo Polytechnic University, where he studied under the photographer Eikoh Hosoe. Through Eikoh Hosoe, he was enlightened to how artistic expression is created. Fumio Tanai's encounter with Daido Moriyama was also decisive.

Receiving an Art Fellowship from the Japanese Government, Fumio Tanai lived in China in 1996 and London in 2005-2006. His extensive international projects done in China, England, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Thailand, Malaysia and Japan have been exhibited in Japan and France since 1990. He currently lives in United States, spending the majority of his time in New York.

Since his beginning, Fumio Tanai has explored the role of photography in connecting the self to others and has demonstrated an enigmatic appeal that allows us to penetrate in social reality. Fumio Tanai's street photography manages to capture the sensitivity of ordinary people and the depth of their identities.

Sous Les Etoiles Gallery is thrilled to present for the first time a selection of his "Signs" series.

As Fumio Tanai likes to explain, "In the present day, we have shifted to an internet society where the world can be connected instantly. The relationship between existence, place and identity has become a common human theme. I lived in London from 2005-2006 and got to know people of diverse nationalities with various views of the world, including doctors, students, hairdressers and professors... I began to photograph them in their own rooms. I had them sit down on a chair and turn diagonally to the front. Although this process of photography was made "law," whereby the freedom of expression was restrained, through this method I trust the arbitrary sight of the subject and at the same time regulate it. Consequently, these images can be compared. I made 100 portraits".

The emotional gray area between freedom and captivity appears in the room where an immigrant lives. The image seems a shell of that internal state, and emphasizes the mimesis between the person and his room in such a relation.
His photographic language expresses an innovative way of seeing. The psychological and interiorized space of the face are emphasized by precise composition and continuous gray, the hallmark of Fumio Tanai's style.