Roman Deppe, who takes sexy photos under the moniker Gojiraphotos, was born and grew up in south Germany, but he hasn’t lived in the country for 17 years.
His job as a video editor for a public broadcaster has sent him to live in different countries around the world for between three and six years at a time. So far that’s included England, Sweden and Japan, but this spring he’ll be moving to India, to spend a few years in New Delhi. “Getting paid for travelling, that’s very nice,” says Deppe.
Wander+Lust asked Deppe for advice on recruiting models, navigating Japan’s gay scene, which is notoriously hard-to-navigate for Westerners, and places to visit in Tokyo and Stockholm.
How did your career as a photographer begin? Did it start out so sexy, photographing mostly male models in very little clothing?
I used to travel with my best friend and he always had a big nice camera with him—this was 20 years ago. He took such nice pictures. I got a nice camera, too, and I very quickly realized: Why are we both carrying big cameras? We’d take pictures of the same things, and it was really heaving hiking up, like, mountains in Iceland with stuff like that. But I still had the camera, so I started looking at photos from photographers that I liked, trying to figure out how they took the photos they did or how they used Photoshop to make their work look like it did.
So when I was living in Sweden I just started using some of my friends as models. “I need somebody in front of the camera, can you pose for me?” And in Sweden, everybody takes very good care of their bodies—we all went to the gym at the time. They were working out so much, they just wanted to show off. So I had all these sporty friends in my photos and other people were like, “Wow, you always have such hot guys in your photos.” But it wasn’t necessarily on purpose. It’s just that in Sweden, people look really good.
Now, even if I’m in a city for just two or three days, I’ll try to find some models and take photos with them. Sometimes it’s very chaotic. Often hotel rooms are very small.
How do you find your models, especially in a place like Japan, where language can be a barrier?
I started out using hookup apps. But very often people think that it’s a pickup line, so it takes some convincing, which I understand. I’ll tell them to go look at my Instagram, then if they like the photos and want photos like that, they can get back to me. Nowadays Instagram works best because I have fairly wide exposure there. So many of my models are known—people will see them and say, “Oh, you took photos of this guy and I can ask that guy how the photo shoot was.” If I’m in Kuala Lumpur, I just check my models from Kuala Lumpur and then I see their friends list. You just have to be really professional with all this and talk about what you intend to do and how you’re going to do it.
What’s the wildest photoshoot you’ve ever done?
That was with Naoto, a guy in Tokyo, who has been one of my most popular models. He hardly speaks any English, and at that time, I hardly spoke Japanese. I just show the model what to do and it works out somehow. I found a really nice hotel that had very beautiful, traditional rooms. I booked that and told him to come over. But at reception, I arrived at the same time as he did. They were a bit suspicious. He was maybe 25 and I was 45 at the time. Maybe they were thinking he was a sex worker. They were like, “No, you can’t take anyone up to your room with you.” But I had rented the room, which wasn’t cheap, just to take photos with him. So I said, “I have so much in my suitcase, it’s heavy, at least let him help me get my stuff to the room. We’ll be back in five minutes, I promise.” We ran up and we took, like, 300 photos in five minutes. He looks great no matter what he does, what pose or what angle. He changed his outfits so fast. I was like, “Take this off, sit over there, go to the window.” Five minutes later, we ran down again, already very sweaty. I’m like, “See, we didn’t do anything dirty in the room.” We got lots of great photos. Sometimes constraints help you a lot because you’re not overthinking stuff, you’re just doing it.
That’s hilarious.
Near where I live in Sweden, there’s a kid’s playground that has a trampoline. I always wanted photos of a model jumping high in the air, taken from below so that it looks like he’s flying through the air. So we did a shoot there, and I had this half-naked guy jumping on the trampoline. I made it clear, of course, that I wasn’t taking any pictures of the kids or other people.
There was another time when I thought about how Sweden has a lot of snow, so let’s take pictures in the snow. One winter I convinced a model to go out with me half naked in the snow. But what happens then? I didn’t think about it. The model was really freezing and very quickly turned blue, his nose red. It looked really stupid and he was suffering a lot.
What’s some advice you’d give about the gay scene in Japan?
The gay scene is very small. The government almost treats LGBTQ+ people like they don’t exist, which I know frustrates my Japanese friends, especially if they want to marry or something like that. But the upside of that is that they leave you alone. You can do whatever you want as long as you don’t bother people. Pride is allowed. There’s no harassment or danger.
Outside of Tokyo it’s really difficult to find any gay scene at all. In Tokyo, Shinjuku is one of the main going out areas. It’s gigantic. And within it, there’s Shinjuku Ni-chōme, which is where the gay bars and other places are, all concentrated in one quarter. You can just walk around the streets there and find most of the places of interest. The city claims to have 300 gay bars, which sounds massive. The thing is, Japanese bars are usually very small, all up in high rises. And so many of these small bars are just for Japanese people. If you don’t speak Japanese, they will not even let you in. Maybe if you have a Japanese friend who takes you there and tells the bar owner you’re fine.
In the end, you have only four or five bars that are suitable for foreigners because people speak English there and also Japanese people who speak English go there. There’s Eagle Tokyo (Shinjuku 2-12-3, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo), and Eagle Tokyo Blue (Casa Verde 1F, B1F Shinjuku 2-11-2, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo) is just around the corner. The Eagle is just one big bar. Eagle Blue is bigger, with a downstairs area where people sing karaoke and you can dance there. They have a DJ.
Aiiro Café (2 Chome−18−1 7 Tenka Bld., 1F, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo) is a little bar where you just stand outside until some guard comes and tells you that you can go inside. There’s so little space inside.
Arty Farty (Chome−11−7, 33, 2, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo) is a gay club for dancing. I’d say that Dragon Men (2 Chome-11-4, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo) is the most famous club. It’s been around the longest and it’s fun if you want to go dancing. It’s always crowded. Beast Tokyo (2 Chome−19−9, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo) is a bear bar. Japanese bears are quite something.
All of these places are within 20 or 30 metres of each other, so once you’ve found The Eagle, you can find the rest just by walking around. Just ask around.
For women, there’s Gold Finger (2 Chome-12-11 Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo), which is an LGBTQ+ bar that hosts women-only parties on Saturdays.
Department H is a monthly fetish night held at Tokyo Kinema Club (1 Chome-1-14 Negishi, Taito City, Tokyo). Imagine a Berliner club with octopus outfits in a great big old cinema transformed into a wild club. It starts around midnight and you bring your own drinks—outside are convenient stores. At some point they have wild shows on stage. Not gay per se, but there is something for everyone.
And how about Stockholm, where you are right now?
Stockholm has gotten a bit difficult. All the Scandinavian countries are very liberal, so the younger generation really doesn’t feel they need gay clubs or bars anymore. They just go where everyone goes.
But there are a few. In the summer you can sit outside at Side Track (Wollmar Yxkullsgatan 7, Stockholm), otherwise it’s down in the cellar. That’s where all my friends go. The Blue Oyster (Långholmsgatan 15c, Stockholm) is a bit younger—guys bring their girl friends and all that. There’s also the weekly Club Backdoor (Arenavägen 75, Stockholm), which is very popular, though a bit outside the city centre.
The party promoter CleanGroup is run by Navid, who does some really big parties in Stockholm, especially for Eurovision, Pride, Christmas and New Year’s and so on. It’s worth checking out his Facebook page for updates. Erik Nielsen Engebretsen runs Pink Pig Productions, which also does some irregular big clubs and events.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
