Sakae Tamura (photographer)

Sakae Tamura (photographer)

Sakae Tamura (田村 榮, Tamura Sakae?, September 17, 1906 - July 22, 1987) was a Japanese photographer, prominent in the years before the war.

Born in Ōtsu, Shiga Prefecture, Tamura graduated from the Tokyo College of Photography (東京写真専門学校, Tōkyō Shashin Senmon Gakkō; now Tokyo Polytechnic University) and entered Oriental (オリエンタル写真工, Orientaru Shashin Kōgyō) in 1928 and became editor of Photo Times. He was an active contributor to the magazine Geijutsu Shashin Kenkyū and in the group Nihon Kōga Kyōkai (日本光画協会), created in 1928 and related to Nihon Kōga Geijutsu Kyōkai (日本光画芸術協会). He was a leading figure in the New Photography Research Society (新興写真研究会, Shinkō Shashin Kenkyūkai), formed in 1930.

Tamura's work was influenced both by pictorialism and by New Photography.

Tamura is particularly known for his portraits, and Shiroi hana (白い花, White flower, 1931) is the best known of these and widely anthologized. Okatsuka says that it expresses a certain lyricism but “displays a more sophisticated sense of maturity” than the works of his contemporaries Masataka Takayama and Jun Watanabe.