Hiroshima-Nagasaki Document 1961 Ken Domon Shomei Tomatsu The Japanese Photobook 1912–1990 Photography

Hiroshima-Nagasaki Document 1961 (Ken Domon, Shomei Tomatsu & others)

“This book–along with Ken Domon’s Hiroshima (1958), Kikuji Kawada’s The Map (1965)and Tomatsu’s 11.02 Nagasaki (1966), and –represents one of the most significant attempts on the part of photographers to memorialize the horror of the 1945 atomic bomb blasts. As Parr and Badger point out, they also mark a progression from a more "sober and didactic tone” to one that is “more symbolic [and] emotive”. Published under the auspices of The Japan Council Against the A and H Bombs, this book comes much closer–in feel at least–to an ‘official’ history than the two books that followed. Many of the photos contained here were reproduced in Tomatsu’s 11.02 Nagasaki, but to very different effect.“ - photoeye

"From pictorialism to Provoke: the most extensive history of Japanese photobooks ever published" Among others the over 500 pages counting book features such renowned photographers as Yoshio Watanabe, Akira Hoshi, Hayao Yoshikawa, Shinichi Kato, Yasuo Wakuda, Tetsuo Kitahara, Moriyama Daido, Koji Taki, Takuma Nakahira, Yutaka Takanashi, Kimura Ihei, Hamaya, Katura, Kazano, Kikuti, Mituzumi, Watanabe, Yamahata, Sozo Okada and Kazano Karuo, among many others. -- "'The Japanese Photobook, 1912–1980' illustrates the development of photography as seen in photo publications in Japan—from the time of influence by European and American pictorialism, the German Bauhaus and Imperial military propaganda, to the complete collapse and destruction of the country in 1945. Then followed a new beginning: with the unique self-determination of a young generation of photographers and visual artists highlighted by the “Provoke” style as well as protest and war documentation of the late 1950s to the early ’70s, the signature Japanese photobook, as we have come to know it, was born.

With detailed information and illustrations of over 400 photo publications, an introduction by Kaneko Ryuichi and essays by Fujimura Satomi, Duncan Forbes, Manfred Heiting, Mitsuda Yuri, Lizawa Kotaro, Shirayama Mari and Matthew S. Witkovsky, this is the first extensive English-language survey of Japanese photobooks of this period." (publisher's note)

About the main author:
Ryuichi Kaneko is a critic, historian, and collector of photobooks. He has authored or contributed to numerous publications, including 'Independent Photographers in Japan 1976–83' (Tokyo Shoseki, 1989), 'The History of Japanese Photography' (Yale University Press and Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2003), 'Japanese Photobooks of the 1960s and ’70s' (Aperture, 2009), and 'Japan’s Modern Divide' (J. Paul Getty Museum)

See also 

Five Aspects of Japanese Photobooks Ryuichi Kaneko Photobook Phenomenon