Biographie
Belgium 1974. After a Master’s in political philosophy at the university of Louvain, Anton Kusters studied photography at STUK, then at the college of art at Hasselt (Flanders). Committed to helping young, emerging photographers, he is a member of the team of the review Burn, founded to this effect by Davis Alan Harvey, photographer with Magnum.
Présentation
A Yakuza family enters a hotel bar in Niigata. My brother and I have negotiated with them for ten months, and we have been granted permission for me to follow and photograph them for two years. As they walk in I watch the extremely subtle social interactions: the micro-expressions on the faces, the gestures, the voices and intonations, the body language, the absolute respect. The criminal element. As customers silently leave the bar to make room for the Godfather, everything seems to be strictly organised, yet at the same time completely natural. Strangely I don’t feel that I need anyone to tell me what to do, where to sit, when to talk or when to shut up. It’s as though the rules and procedures were understood by everyone, without the need for a word to be spoken.