Background
Satō was born on 30 July 1930 in Tokyo.
佐藤 明
Satō was born on 30 July 1930 in Tokyo.
He graduated in 1953 and one year later became a freelance photographer, specializing in fashion.
While a student of economics at Yokohama National University he was an avid reader of Life and other photographic and fashion magazines at the American International Commission on Illumination library in Hibiya. From around 1956 he was caught up with new trends in photography, and he participated in the 1957 exhibition Jūnin no me (10人の眼, Eyes of ten), subsequently joining the collective "Vivo". Satō had a series of one-man shows starting in 1961, alongside publications within the camera magazines.
He specialized in black-and-white photographs of girls: their faces in close-up, their bodies surrounded by nature.
In 1963 Satō went to the United States and then Europe. He returned to Japan in 1965.
Thereafter he made many trips to Europe, particularly Scandinavia and Vienna, primarily photographing in color. Satō died on 2 April 2002.