Marcel Winatschek

Pink Wig, 3 AM

The Shibuya crossing at night. Someone in a pink wig standing in the middle of it, deliberately stopping pedestrians from crossing. That’s Julia Abe for you—half-Japanese, half-Brazilian, everywhere in Tokyo’s photography world.

She appeared on Tumblr with a portfolio of shoots and selfies, and suddenly every underground photographer and street-style brand in the city wanted her. But her Twitter tells you something real: mostly resentment about being half-Japanese in Japan, which is the most honest thing she does.

The pink wig was for a Places + Faces shoot through Tokyo’s night streets. The Lost in Translation thing was deliberate, but not ironic—just occupied. That’s what Tokyo does at three in the morning. The absurdity of what you’re doing and the inevitability of it become the same thing. A model in a pink wig blocking traffic. Funny until the city swallows it.