鎧潟をさがす旅［in depth］
5/17［日］― 29［金］
niigata eya exhibition 713
作家在廊予定日：5/17・20・26・29
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本間とは7年前の「潟の記憶展」（砂丘館）で親しくなった。「潟」は干拓で消えた鎧潟。直接見ていないその潟を、それぞれの理由で見、ふれたい思いをどちらも深めてきた。
2度目の写真展となる今回、本間はカメラを水に沈めた。大地の窪みに溜まった潟の水が、世界を上下に二分することで生まれる豊かさ。水鳥が羽を休め、菱が実り、魚が行きかう世界は干上がった土地にはもうない。それでもわずかに残された水に身を沈め、浮かべ、消えたその二重の世界を見ようとする願いの強さが、本間の写真に「美しい」を越えた、真実の光を与えている。（企画者・文：大倉 宏／主催：新潟絵屋＋企画者）
I became close friends with Yusuke Honma seven years ago at the “Memories of the Lagoon” exhibition (Sakyukan). The “lagoon” in question was Yoroi Lagoon, which had vanished due to land reclamation. Though neither of us had seen it firsthand, we both developed a deep desire, for our own reasons, to see and connect with that lagoon.
For this, his second photography exhibition, Honma submerged his camera in water. The richness born from the lagoon water pooled in the earth’s hollows, dividing the world into upper and lower realms. A world where waterfowl rest their wings, Trapa jeholensi bear fruit, and fish swim freely no longer exists on the dried-up land. Yet, the intensity of his desire to immerse himself in the scant remaining water, to float upon it, and to glimpse that vanished dual world imbues Honma’s photographs with a light of truth that transcends mere “beauty.” (Exhibition Planner and Text: Hiroshi Okura / Organized by: Niigata Eya + Exhibition Planner)
PHOTO（上）:「重なる刻」2019年
PHOTO（上）:「生命の瞬き」2025年
本間裕介（ほんま ゆうすけ）
1975年新発田市生まれ。18歳で天野尚と出会い、自然に対する天野の考え方に深く共感し、その後株式会社アクアデザインアマノに入社。天野の撮影やネイチャーアクアリウム制作の助手を天野が亡くなるまで約20年にわたり務めた。現在は同社の水景クリエーターとして制作、啓蒙活動を行っている。 instagram＠yusuke_homma_ada
Yusuke Homma
Born in 1975 in Shibata City, Japan. At the age of 18, he met Hisashi Amano and deeply resonated with Amano’s philosophy regarding nature; Honma subsequently joined Aqua Design Amano Co., Ltd. He served as Amano’s assistant on his photography projects and in the creation of nature aquariums for approximately 20 years, until Amano’s passing. He currently works as an aquascape creator for the company, engaged in both creative production and educational outreach.
instagram＠yusuke_homma_ada
PHOTO:「生きる方へ」2025年
関連イベント
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（66分間／2026.5.18［月］18:30-19:36収録）
写真が捉えた潟の世界を写真家と潟の研究者（地形学）が語り合いました。
お話：本間裕介・澤口晋一（新潟国際情報大学教授）
聞き手：大倉 宏
配信：ツムジグラフィカ
通販サイトeyashop 発売スタート！
8/31［月］18:00まで
＊2024年の出品作品を追加しました(6/21〜)
▶ 2024年 本間裕介写真展 鎧潟をさがす旅／Journey To Find Yoroigata
BSNテレビ
NEWS「写真家・水景クリエイターとして活躍した亡き師匠 天野尚の原点 消えた『鎧潟』を探して…」
＊動画をご覧いただけます（2024.6.20放送）
Yoroigata
A lake (lagoon) that once spanned the former towns of Makimachi, Nishikawamachi, and the former village of Katahigashi in Nishikambara District, Niigata Prefecture (now Nishikambara Ward, Niigata City). It measured 2.5 km in both the east-west and north-south directions. It was the largest lagoon among the lakes and marshes of the Echigo Plain. The people living around Yoroigata continued the way of life passed down from the Jomon period—including hunting (migratory birds such as ducks) and gathering (water chestnut seeds, lotus roots, etc.)—while also engaging in agriculture, fishing (for crucian carp, carp, eels, etc.), and hunting (migratory birds such as ducks) and gathering (water chestnut seeds, lotus seeds, etc.)—lifestyles passed down from the Jōmon period—while also enjoying the lake’s bounty through boating, fishing, and finding solace in the beautiful scenery of the four seasons, living in harmony with the lake. In the surrounding low-lying wetlands, which were frequently hit by floods due to their low elevation, efforts—including the construction of the Shin-kawa Canal in the late Edo period to drain the three lakes of Yoroigata,Tagata, and Ogata,along with efforts to improve the land and expand arable farmland. Before land reclamation progressed in the Meiji era, Kai-gata played a significant role as a flood retention basin,However, after the war, driven by the rapid need to increase food production and at the request of farmers, a plan for full-scale reclamation was drawn up, and construction of the “State-Operated Yoroigata Reclamation Project” began in 1958. This massive undertaking involved diverting the flow of the three rivers feeding the lagoon into newly excavated canals and constructing five drainage pumping stations to drain the water all at once(within a few days). Full reclamation was completed in 1966, and the following year, 234 hectares of paddy fields were developed. As a result, the rich and diverse flora and fauna that inhabited the lagoon were wiped out, and migratory birds and migratory fish lost their habitats and places to return to. Most of the reclaimed land went to the residents of the Endo, for whom fishing and agriculture were the mainstays of their livelihoods. However, even before the reclamation, issues had begun to arise—such as the appearance of deformed fish due to wastewater discharged from upstream factories. Some view the realization of the Yoroigata reclamation as the result of a complex interplay of factors: the desire to provide land to people who no longer saw a future in fishing, the wish to avoid the resistance faced by the Hachirogata project, and the intention to prevent the emergence of land title disputes.
Yoroigata was an ideal playground for local children. Takashi Amano, who played there as a boy, recalls that Yoroigata—a “sanctuary for living creatures”—was a place that “opened a precious door deep within me that even I didn’t know existed.” Beyond that door, he would eventually recreate the world of the lagoon inside a glass tank in the form of a “Nature Aquarium.” In today’s Yoroi Lagoon—said to have been transformed into “fertile farmland”—a concrete irrigation canal runs along three sides. Amano remarked that there is now almost no room for the creatures that once inhabited the lagoon to live, and it has turned into a green desert.
as captured in an aerial photograph of Kai-gata taken by the U.S. military on May 6, 1948.
