Move Through Time

The keep went up in 1594 and has never been fought over. What nearly finished it was peace — in the Meiji years the castle was set to come down, and it’s standing today because people in Matsumoto refused to let that happen. Four centuries on, it’s a National Treasure with no job left to do and no intention of going anywhere.

I’d shot Himeji and Osaka on an earlier trip. Matsumoto was the top of the list for this one. We were there in spring during Golden Week, cherry and azalea in bloom, the wisteria already gone over.

The red span across the front is the Uzumi Bridge, closed to traffic. Nothing crosses it. In this framing it works as a pedestal — a hard diagonal laid under all that black timber. Eight seconds on the shutter pulled the moat flat and set the water running the same way the bridge runs, so the whole base of the frame leans in one direction and carries the eye up into the keep.

The full-colour version fought itself. Hard saturated blue in the sky, and the moat water in that spot turned an ochre I could do nothing with; between them they pulled attention straight off the building. So everything but the bridge came down to black and white. It’s the only one of my Matsumoto frames I’ve handled this way, and the second castle to get it — Himeji’s Only Color Left was the first — so the two of them sit together in my head as a pair.