Mai Tanaka

—Tell us about the area you live in.

Right now I am based in the Shakujii area of Nerima. I live in a quiet residential neighborhood with a nice green park nearby and good access to central Tokyo.

I found this property just a minute’s walk to Shakujii Park. My son turned three years old in 2025, and I took that opportunity to move here from central Tokyo. I chose this area because it’s convenient for my office in Sendagaya and it’s close to an entrance to the expressway network, since I do a lot of location shooting on the outskirts of the Kanto region.

― What type of photography do you normally work in?

I worked as a freelance photographic assistant before establishing my company five years ago together with my husband, also a freelance public relations consultant. In addition to offering my services as a photographer, at present I am involved in the creative process overall as a director and producer.

Advertising, fashion, lifestyle, and food photography—I work in a wide range of genres, but especially a lot of outdoor gear and apparel and catalogs.

—You have a small child. As a working mother, what do you feel is special about this place?

The Shakujii area is just the right distance from the big city, perfect for the mother of a small child. Our favorite spot here is Shakujii Park. We love to admire the cherry blossoms in the spring, look for insects and crayfish in the summer, and enjoy the nasty smell of the ginkgo seeds in the autumn during our daily walks to watch the wild birds at Sanpoji Pond.

― Do you ever shoot in the countryside?

For the past ten years, my life’s work has been photographing the Boo-Hoo-Woo Farm in Nirasaki City, Yamanashi Prefecture. It’s known as a champion of animal welfare and a pioneer of pasture-raised pig farming in Japan.

The pigs are raised for their meat—pork for human consumption—so while the pigs are alive, the farm commits to encouraging sound growth in a comfortable, natural environment. The decency of that approach has inspired me to go back for regular photo shoots. The pigs raised in their stress-free environment are not wary of humans. They’re curious and enjoying running with us and being petted by us.

I haven’t been able to edit and curate my photographs for presentation just yet, as juggling work and childcare is quite a handful. For now, I just value my visits to the farm and the time I spend there with my son. Our lives are sustained by the life that we consume—my hope is that we can make this awareness a natural part of who we are.

― Do you have any other projects that you call your life’s work?

Yes, my other life’s work is photographing the residents and users of the social welfare facility Yuai Gakuen, in Ome City.

In daily life, there are very few opportunities to interact with people with severe intellectual disabilities. Back when I had no such real-life experience, I was under the impression they lived in a world far removed from my own.

A friend who works as a care provider at Studio Yuai, an art studio set up within Yuai Gakuen, invited me to observe the users’ creative activities, and that led to the beginning of my photo shoots there. What I saw was a complete departure from the internal conflict I’d had all my life—it was a world of pure expression.

In the simple course of their daily lives, the users were churning out one artwork after another. My reaction to that was a mix of straightforward awe and envy, hopeless defeat, and pleasant stimulation. I haven’t found a good way to describe those feelings just yet, but through my regular visits to Studio Yuai, I believe I am trying to reawaken the me before I had settled into my career as a photographer, when I had only just a passion to do something.

My photo shoots today are not only for my personal project but also for jobs commissioned by the facility, such as renovating its website, documenting its exhibitions, and compiling a book of artworks produced at the studio. The time I spend with the users is precious, as it helps me revisit my origins as a creator.

― What is your next area of interest, or what would you like to try in the future, either in daily life or in a specific area or community?

I tend to get swamped with the hustles of daily life, like running the company and caring for my child, but moving forward, I’d like to learn to live in the moment, share it with the people I love, and capture it on camera—not just to document the moment, but to set aside the time to channel my emotions and energy into my creative output.

I used to have an internal conflict. I believed that I wouldn’t qualify as a photographer unless I presented my work and won prizes and published photobooks. But now, I feel that all my photographs—the one’s I shoot both on the job and for my life’s work—are interconnected and influence one another creatively. I would be happy if I could go on building a body of works that I’m confident only I could have photographed.

I want to continue engaging with nature and life, and by doing so, hone my mind and grow as a human being. I hope to go on interacting with people and using my skills in photography to contribute to society in my unique way, and to keep on evolving into a better person.

Mai Tanaka
Mai Tanaka was born in 1985 in Saitama Prefecture. She graduated from the Tokyo Polytechnic University Faculty of Arts Department of Photography and worked as a freelance photographic assistant before going independent in 2011. She and her husband, a public relations consultant in the outdoor industry, established the company GK Yamayama in 2021. Tanaka works in genres such as advertising, fashion, and outdoor photography while overseeing the creative process overall as a director, and works with client brands to produce creative problem-solving contents from People Showroom, her base in Sendagaya. Her life’s work is the long-term documentation of the pasture-raised pigs at Boo-Hoo-Woo Farm in Yamanashi Prefecture, and the creative activities of the people at the social welfare facility Yuai Gakuen in Ome City. As a mother of one, Tanaka observes daily living, the workings of life, and the origins of expression, and through her photography and language, continues exploring an evermore “human” way of life.＠maitanakaphotograph