Life Blood

• Prize
  Silver in Nature/Other
• Photographer
  Mariko Masumoto, Japan

The high, soaring splash of the waves always makes me feel the energy of life. There is a Japanese word "chisio". As the word suggests, blood flows quickly through the body like the tide. I liken the different marks that the waves leave for a moment on the beach to blood vessels. And the tide is controlled by the moon. Each of us is a grain of sand in the universe, changing like a wave. Now, new technologies are rapidly replacing the human form, voice, and even emotions. Society and the individual seem to be swiftly losing their physicality. Will we one day be asked what it means to be alive?