Kingpouge Laika 12 78 Photos Photography By Hiromi Saimon Top -
The final 18 photos are pure abstraction. White noise, overexposed curtains blowing in a derelict hospital, and negative space. The series ends with Photo 78—a completely black frame, save for a single pinprick of light. A dead pixel. Or a star. You decide.
A narrative shift. Saimon constructs miniature dioramas of a rocket launch using trash from electronic markets. He then burns the edges of the prints. The "12" concept becomes clear here—12 sequential shots of a match being lit, a model rocket wobbling, and dissolving into smoke. The message: All exploration ends in entropy. The final 18 photos are pure abstraction
A short, evocative chronicle reflecting on the photographic series "Kingpouge Laika 12·78" by Hiromi Saimon. This piece treats the title as a locus of myth, object, and time: Kingpouge (a hybrid, enigmatic figure), Laika (the canine cosmonaut and emblem of sacrifice), and 12·78 (a timestamp that suggests a precise moment or encoded memory). The aim is to be dynamic, layered, and structured to guide a reader through context, visual motifs, emotional registers, and practical details for further engagement. A dead pixel
The opening eight photos are abstract and claustrophobic. Saimon uses heat-distorted imagery of stray dogs in Shinjuku alleys, overlaid with double exposures of satellite dishes and abandoned capsule hotels. The grain is so heavy that the dogs appear as ghosts. The best of these, Photo 07, shows a single eye of a Shiba Inu reflected in a oily puddle, with a toy Sputnik floating in the reflection. A narrative shift
The middle third of the series is purely tactile. Extreme macro shots of peeling skin, rusted metal, and the emulsion side of damaged film negatives. Saimon scratches the negatives in camera before development. Look for Photo 33: a close-up of a chapped lip kissing a shattered mirror. It is simultaneously repulsive and breathtaking.
This is where the "king" arrives. Saimon photographed a homeless man known only as "Pouge" in the Ueno park slums, posing him in discarded office chairs wrapped in plastic sheeting. The top image from this set (Photo 14) features the subject holding a broken CRT television showing static. It’s a terrifying commentary on modern royalty—kings of nothing, watching dead signals.