Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on May 2012

Is it real or fake? Should we care? At first glance, German artist Thomas Demand’s photographs of nuclear control rooms and presidential offices look real. On closer examination they yield small clues that they are in fact cardboard constructions of Demand’s making. In the conceptual artist’s first major exhibition in Japan, viewers are asked to question their perceptions of key places and events in recent history. Says New York Times art critic Michael Kimmelman: “The reconstructions were meant to be close to, but never perfectly, realistic so that the gap between truth and fiction would always subtly show.”

Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, until Jul 8 (listing).