Sweat-slicked skin, inked bodies, white fundoshi and flashes of bare flesh pressing against one another beneath the feverish Tokyo sun. Ornate irezumi ripples across backs and shoulders as bodies surge through the streets of Asakusa, carrying mikoshi through a crowd alive with heat, ritual and noise. It is here, amid the beautiful collision of the sacred and the unruly, that Sly Morikawa found the inspiration for her upcoming solo exhibition Devotion.
Photographed during Tokyo’s Sanja Matsuri in 2026, Morikawa’s series turns its gaze towards the yakuza families historically entwined with the festival. Her lens lends an intimacy that complicates the mythology surrounding them, creating visuals that bridge the visceral with the tender, finding dignity in bodies, gestures and fleeting moments.
Across Devotion, the word itself becomes elastic: devotion to family, to the painstaking permanence of irezumi, to tradition, ritual and ways of living outside society’s prescribed edges.
Ahead of the exhibition’s opening this Friday at China Heights in Sydney’s Surry Hills, RUSSH speaks with Morikawa about instinct, trust, duality, and knowing when to press the shutter.
What was it about Sanja Matsuri that first made you want to photograph it?
I’ve always been interested in the outsider narrative, whether that’s through the lens of subcultures, or simply through the lives of people who don’t live how society expects them to. I’m particularly drawn to these stories in Japan, and all the expressions of rebellion that exist within a society that places such a strict emphasis on conformity. I’ve had a long fascination with the yakuza, but also with delinquent youth (“yankii”) cultures like bosozoku and sukeban. I love gyaru, I love Japanese car culture (especially drifting), and I love tattoos.
Years ago I read about the yakuza’s involvement in Sanja Matsuri, and was immediately curious to know more and experience the festival for myself. It felt like a culmination of my interests – the intersection of yakuza, irezumi (traditional Japanese tattoos), and the display of Japanese tradition and cultural practices.
“I’m particularly drawn to these stories in Japan, and all the expressions of rebellion that exist within a society that places such a strict emphasis on conformity.”
Why did Devotion feel like the right title for this body of work?
Devotion began as a documentary piece highlighting the yakuza families of Asakusa and their irezumi at Sanja Matsuri in 2024. The title Devotion is a reference to three elements – the yakuza’s commitment and loyalty to their families, the dedication towards their bodysuits, as well as the spiritual nature of the festival itself.
When you’re taking a photograph, what are you usually waiting or looking for?
I think I’m just looking for beauty and honesty. It’s about recognising someone or something’s dignity and character and in a sense, and wanting to preserve that. Recognising there’s beauty in everything.
But I’m never waiting for a specific scene. It’s more of a flow state, it’s like my mind turns off and my eyes and hands move on their own. I’m not a technical photographer – I don’t understand lighting and equipment in the way that many photographers do and I’ve never bothered to understand it (perhaps to a fault). I really enjoy shooting intuitively, and the less I know, the less I have to think about, the more present I can be.
How much time do you like to spend with someone before you photograph them?
It depends. In an ideal world I’d love to have the time to develop lasting connections with everyone I photograph. I’m curious about the people I shoot, and I want to understand people for who they really are. But I don’t think it necessarily leads to better photos. Some of the photographs I take are intimate and vulnerable, and others were just because I happened to be there at the right time. A single photo by a street photographer can reveal the intimacy of a moment as much as a whole series dedicated to one’s lover might. I think it depends on the person and the moment.
‘Devotion 11’, Giclée print on canson rag, 42cm x 59.4cm
There’s a real sense of trust in your images. How do you build that with the people you photograph?
I’m not sure, maybe trust is just built on honesty. I think it goes back to what I was saying about recognising someone’s dignity. I see people for who they are and not what society and its rules and hierarchies want us to believe. I don’t project ideas or expectations onto the people I photograph.
“There’s no chasing perfection. I love the physicality of it. Every frame is a choice with a permanent result.”
Your photographs can feel both completely spontaneous and somehow perfectly composed. Is that something you think about when you’re shooting?
It’s not something I’m doing intentionally but maybe it’s another expression of the duality that often exists in my work. Light and dark, stillness and chaos, heaven and hell – or in this case, to feel both completely spontaneous and perfectly composed. I’ve only ever found balance and harmony in my life from experiencing and honouring duality, it’s a core principle for me and so it tends to emerge in the photographs I take.
What do you love most about shooting on film?
I mean, that’s probably where that spontaneity comes in. I love that it keeps me present. It’s allowed me to build a deep trust in my vision, and it allows me to pay closer attention to the world around me. There’s no chasing perfection. I love the physicality of it. Every frame is a choice with a permanent result.
You mention Martha Cooper being a defining influence on your work. What was your introduction to her work?
I came across her work in her Tokyo Tattoo 1970 book, which in hindsight was a bit unusual as it was only after this that I became aware of her role in documenting early New York graffiti culture. Most people would know her as the renowned graffiti photographer first and foremost. But I think encountering it this way made me resonate with her work more for her ability to enter subcultures with respect and capture their essence from the inside out.
Is there an image in this show that you hope people linger a little longer on?
Not particularly, I hope people enjoy the photographs but I’ll never hold any expectations on the viewer. Each to their own.
Devotion by Sly Morikawa opens Friday 14 August 2026 and continues until 13 September 2026 at China Heights Gallery in Sydney. Find gallery opening hours and see the full Devotion catalogue on the China Heights website.
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