British photographer Michael Kenna first visited Japan in 1987 and was utterly seduced by the country's terrain. He felt a deep sense of history in the land and has returned to Asia time and again, traveling across India, Thailand, Vietnam, China and South Korea, in addition to Japan, to explore landscapes and portray their latent atmosphere.

Kenna’s work is enigmatic, graceful and hauntingly beautiful. His black and white landscapes are often made at dawn or in the dark hours of night with exposures up to 10 hours. Kenna has said that "you can't always see what's otherwise noticeable during the day…with long exposures you can photograph what the human eye is incapable to seeing."

Join Asia Society Southern California at Peter Fetterman Gallery for a cocktail reception and conversation with Michael Kenna. The artist will discuss his travels to Asia throughout his 35-year long career, and sign copies of three of his books, Hokkaido, Shinan, and France.

* This event is by invitation only. 

Michael Kenna was born in Widnes, England, to a working-class Irish-Catholic family. He initially aspired to enter the priesthood, but his passion for the arts led him to The Banbury School of Art, where he studied painting and then photography. Later he attended the London College of Printing and began working as a photographer and artist. He moved to San Francisco in 1977 where he was astounded by the number of galleries the city housed which allowed artists to showcase and sell their work.

Kenna's prints have been shown in numerous exhibitions throughout the world with permanent collections in the Bibliotheque, Paris, The Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague, The National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, and the Victoria and Albert Museum.