Japan

Japan is a prominent country in photography today, and especially regarding the desiging and  publishing of photography books; this position is not recent. Since the post-war period in particular, Japanese photographers, publishers and designers have been very productive and very innovative in the design of photography integrated into a book ob...
Japan is a prominent country in photography today, and especially regarding the desiging and  publishing of photography books; this position is not recent. Since the post-war period in particular, Japanese photographers, publishers and designers have been very productive and very innovative in the design of photography integrated into a book object, with particular attention to the manufacture, layout, papers, bindings, slipcases and boxes...
For example, some still think that Ed Ruscha's book Every Building on the Sunset Strip (self-published, 1966) is the first photobook in Leporello format ("accordion binding"), while the book Ginza Kaiwai / Ginza Haccho by Yoshikazu Suzuki & Kimura Shohachi, with two panoramas on two separate accordions from Tokyo's Ginza district, was released by Toho-Shuppan, Tokyo in 1954, 12 years earlier!
Great Japanese photographers have become known through their books and collaborations, between photographers on the Provoke magazine project (three volumes in 1968 and 1969, created by Takuma Nakahira and Yukata Takanashi among others, and a collaboration with Daido Moriyama, etc.) or with renowned designers such as Eikoh Hosoe's Kamaitachi casing by Tadanori Yokoo (published by Gendai Shicho Sha, Tokyo, 1969).


Japanese photography, and the Japanese edition of photography books, are still extremely dynamic today. Only a small part of the books published in Japan are available in bookstores around the world, but many photographers - like their elders Daido Moriyama and Nobuyoshi Araki who still publish with the same regularity - are today recognized and widely followed beyond Japan.

Examples include Rinko Kawauchi, Koji Onaka, Atsushi Fujiwara, Toshio Shibataand more recently Daisuke Yokota and Kazuma Obara.

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Japan There are 188 books.

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Showing 33 - 64 of 188 items
  • Quick view Shiga, Lieko
    72,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by T&M Projects:  " It was the summer of 2009 in Bangkok, Thailand, that Shiga photographed couples on motorbikes. In this city Shiga exchanged glances with hundreds and thousands of people on the back seat of motorbikes. The camera seemed to be the ideal tool for getting closer to that strange feeling of receiving glances without...

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  • .Copy sold. Presentation by Akaaka (excerpt):  " In 2009, Lieko Shiga moved to Kitakama, a coastal town in Japan's Tōhoku region [north of the main island of Honshū], where she began working as the town's official photographer. This move marked a significant turning point for Shiga, and RASEN KAIGAN collects this new body of work into a book. Shiga's...

  • Quick view Yu-ki, Abe
    48,00 € In Stock

    Presentation by Roshin Books: " A deep fog usually envelops Mount Kirigamine (literally « Summit of Fog »). Once the mountain is covered by the fog, all boundaries disappear, and the fog seems to extend into infinity. A while ago, the mountain was home to a ski resort, large enough to include two ski jumping platforms. The mountain was a candidate to...

    48,00 €
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  • Quick view Anrakuji, Emi
    85,00 € Out of stock

    .Very last copy!. Presentation by akaaka :  " Emi Anrakuji's Balloon Position, through a Cyclopean gaze, literally the artist's vision, impaired by suffering a brain tumour, attempts to reconstruct the shattered self that was suspended between conflicting internal and external chaos. Life near death, eternal rainfall, the artist gives herself to the...

    85,00 €
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  • .Sold out. Presentation by Nazraeli Press: " For over thirty years, Michael Kenna has photographed temples, shrines, gardens, seascapes and landscapes, in black and white, throughout Japan. Ten years ago, he also began to photograph female nudes in various locations in Japan. A selection of these photographs was unveiled to the public for the first time...

  • .Sold out. Presentation by Ceiba: " « My father was a bit plump, he looked grumpy and didn't laugh much in front of me. As time passed by, he became smaller and smaller. Long after I left home to live on my own, my father bought a black dog. Its belly was partly white, which contrasted with its body. The doggy's name is Kuro, which means black in...

  • Quick view Yamamoto, Masao
    78,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by T&M Projects: " During his long career, Masao Yamamoto has created works that carefully pick up familiar animals, plants, landscapes, and other small things that are likely to be overlooked. The photos have been brewed into beauty with delicate breathing and a sense of tension by a superlative monochrome technique. This Bonsai -...

    78,00 €
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  • Presentation by Ceiba: " « The structure of the dummy reveals an eclectic use of notebook style and a very thorough research. The dummy deals with the emotional cries of children raised in abusive homes. The jury was impressed by the way Miki Hasegawa approached this extremely difficult subject matter. A book not easy to digest but nonetheless very...

    65,00 €
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  • Quick view Yoshiyuki, Kohei
    60,00 € Out of stock

    .Back in stock. Presentation by Radius Books: " For his notorious Park photos, taken by night in Tokyo's Shinjuku, Yoyogi, and Aoyama parks during the 1970s, Kohei Yoshiyuki used a 35mm camera, infrared film and flash to capture a secret community of lovers and voyeurs. His pictures document the people who gathered in these parks at night for clandestine...

    60,00 €
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  • .Sold out. Presentation by Nakladatelství wo-men (excerpts): "The book Černé roky (The Black Years) introduces the authentic photographic and literary journals of the influential underground photographer Libuše Jarcovjáková, also known as the Czech Nan Goldin. Spanning the years 1971–1987, the journals wring out the black-and-white everydayness of...

  • Presentation of an exhibition of the project at Salon Nikon, Tokyo (2008) : Text taken from the website Tokyo Art Beat "Goats are the spitting image of Okinawa. Although they have a mild temper and a fairly gentle personality, they are killed and eaten in the end for their fine flavor. The title of the exhibition is a sort of symbol for Okinawan history...

    59,00 €
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  • .Back in stock. Presentation by Editions Xavier Barral: "This publication tells the story of young man, Daiki, whose life was entirely dedicated to his grandmother, Yukimi. Fascinated and deeply touched by this unique relationship, photographer Akihito Yoshida, cousin of Daiki and also grandchild of Yukimi, decides to narrate this story. He photographs...

    42,00 €
    In Stock
  • .Sold out. Presentation by the(M) éditions: " « Right after the Fukushima nuclear plant accident, I found a blog about peacocks that were left in the evacuation zone, within the 20km limit. I started imagining those peacocks, walking around the empty town with their beautiful wings spread. The image I had in my mind seemed so far away from what was going...

  • Quick view Onaka, Koji
    75,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Imageless: "This photobook is the fifth monograph of Japanese photographer Koji Onaka, its first edition was published in 2003, and the current  version  is  the  third  edition.  Koji  Onaka  compares  a  boat's  sailing  to  his  way  of  life  and  photography,  and  this  book of 84 black and white photographs recording his life and...

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  • Quick view Katayama, Mari
    65,00 € Out of stock

    .Back in stock - Signed copies!.Presentation by United Vagabonds:  "GIFT is a retrospective of her past works and evolution as an artist. Born with only two fingers on her left hand and tibial hemimelia, a rare deficiency in which one leg bone is absent, Katayama got both her legs amputated at the age of nine, and has since then transcended her condition...

    65,00 €
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  • Quick view Cairns, Antony
    65,00 € Out of stock

    .Sold out. Presentation by Morel Books: "CTY brings together a large selection of Antony Cairns' oeuvre from his various cities/projects in London, Las Vegas, Tokyo and Osaka, (including LDN3, LDN4, LPT and OSC), interspersed with 6 texts by Simon Baker (former senior curator of photography, TATE, London, and Director of Maison Européenne de la...

    65,00 €
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  • .Sold out. Presentation by The Gould Collection: "Hypermarché – Novembre, the third volume in The Gould Collection, partners Japanese photographer Motoyuki Daifu with French writer Michel Houellebecq to critically explore themes of love, pain, family and daily life.Through a probing and often humorous lens, Tokyo-based Motoyuki Daifu’s photographs explore...

  • .Sold out.New facsimilé edition of the 3 volumes of the seminal Provoke magazine initially published in November 1968, March 1969 and August 1969, widely considered the cornerstone of the new Japanese photography in the 1970s and beyond. This magazine was created by critic & photographers Kōji Taki and Takuma Nakahira, photographer Yutaka Takanashi,...

  • Quick view Collectif
    75,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation par 10x10 Photobooks:   ".About How We See With historical records establishing 19th-century British photographer Anna Atkins’s Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions (1843-1853) as the first photobook, it is not surprising that women have consistently contributed to the rich history of photobook making. 10×10 Photobooks has...

    75,00 €
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  • .Sold out. Dark Cities is a self-published project in a thin-cardboard folder containing 3 books that are 3 perceptions of Singapore, Tokyo and Seoul through the « lens » of a specific and unusual location: a carpark (01 - Carpark), a run-down tower (02 - Capsule), an old city quarter (03 - Euljiro).  The original training as architect of the artist Shyue...

  • .Back in stock. Presentation by Łukasz Rusznica: "When traveling to Japan, I knew one thing only — I wanted to take pictures based on Japanese mythology; I wanted to photograph the Yokai — the monsters of legend. Photography came as the result of working in new surroundings; it was the end process of meeting people and building relationships — this is...

    52,00 €
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  • .French and English versions both available.Presentation by Editions Xavier Barral: "Japanese photographer Masahisa Fukase is among the most radical and original of his generation, famous for The Solitude of Ravens, in which these birds of doom, in flocks or alone, blacken the pages cover to cover of his legendary book released in 1986. He also has a...

    65,00 €
    In Stock
  • Quick view AM Projects
    160,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Dienacht Publishing: "NOCTURNES is a unique boxed set of 6 books by the new photography group « AM projects » and published by dienacht Publishing. This book is printed using different papers for each photo essay – one even has an enormous fold-out poster. It is a landmark in photobook production.NOCTURNES is the first « AM » project and...

    160,00 €
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  • Quick view Araki, Nobuyoshi
    45,00 € Out of stock

    .One copy available.Presentation by HeHe: "This exhibition catalogue focuses on one theme from his vast oeuvre, his wife Yoko. As Araki himself has said, « It’s thanks to Yoko that I became a photographer. » From their meeting in 1968 until her death in 1990, Yoko was his most important subject. She has continued to be a major influence on his photography...

    45,00 €
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    Out of stock
  • Quick view Maki
    52,00 € Out of stock

    .Signed copies back in stock. Presentation by Zen Foto Gallery : "This latest publication by French photographer Maki includes images taken between 2001 and 2015 during many visits to Japan. The high-contrast black-and-white photos, from streetsnaps to portraits, landscapes and the occasional erotic image, paint a manifold picture of Maki’s extensive...

    52,00 €
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    Out of stock
  • Quick view Suzuki, Mayumi
    65,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Ceiba Editions : "This outstanding dummy tells, visually, the story of the loss of the photographer's parents in the 2011 tsunami that occurred in Japan. The jury found the visual story and the narrative very powerful, and also perceived the struggle in finding an adequate way of telling the story of a personal loss of such magnitude. With...

    65,00 €
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    Out of stock
  • Quick view Rumando, Tokyo
    49,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Zen Foto :   "Tokyo Rumando's new body of work S incorporates theatrical elements, which transform her self-portraits from a story into a play, performed at ther own stage theatre, leading the viewer into another time and space..«  S is Story     She=S     S=Sexualviolet     S is es     S is Sandglass     Sayonara S »          -- Tokyo...

    49,00 €
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  • Quick view Takagi, Yusuke
    80,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Akina Books : " « Kagerou : the heat haze, a lake in the desert, decay heat powered by the nuclear radiation, invisible, pervasive. It was 12 March 2011. The day after Fukushima nuclear disaster, I woke up in a shrouded Tokyo: the cityscape looked blurred and twisted. Nobody else seemed to notice: for 37 million people it was business as...

    80,00 €
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    Out of stock
  • Quick view Hirose, Kouhei
    60,00 € Out of stock

    Presentation by Zen Foto Gallery : "Yokushiroku  is the first photobook publication by Kouhei Hirose, whose work has been exhibited by notable Tokyo photo galleries for several years. Hirose’s style of photography - or rather of making prints - immediately stands out: through experimentation with chemicals during the printing process, Hirose adds an...

    60,00 €
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    Out of stock
  • .Last two copies!. Presentation by Case Publishing : "Takuma Nakahira's series Overflow was originally presented as an installation during the 1974 exhibition « Fifteen Photographers Today » (National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo). The work consisted of 42 color photographs that were arranged on a wall 6 meters wide and 1.8 meters high. The photobook...

    49,00 €
    In Stock
  • .Sold out. Presentation by Case Publishing:  "Remote Past a Memoir 1951-1966 has been published in conjunction with the third Daikanyama Photo Fair, for which his woks have served as the main visuals. The photobook focuses on the years 1951 -1966, an early period during which Kawada established his own photographic voice, and features works - highly...

  • Quick view Hashimoto, Shoko
    55,00 € Out of stock

    Excerpts from the text by Shoko Hashimoto :    [adapted by L'Ascenseur Végétal] "Nishiyama Onsen was packed with pleasure trippers. This healing hot spring is in the Yamanashi Prefecture, on a tributary of the Fuji River. People would come from nearby Yamanashi and Shizuoka, but also parties of local ladies returning from homes in the suburbs of Tokyo and...

    55,00 €
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Showing 33 - 64 of 188 items

Three photo books that are milestones in the history of Japanese photography

There is a wide array of photobooks to chose from, not an easy task! But some of the most important Japanese photography books include:

-          Chizu / The Map by Kikuji Kawada (Bijutsu Shuppansha, 1965), a complex book published for the 20th anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing, which traces, between abstraction and realism, the post-Japanese war and, among others, the very peculiar relationship with the United States.

-          Kitarubeki kotoba no tame ni / For a Language to Come by Takuma Nakahira (Fudosha, 1970 and Osiris, 2010) and Daido Moriyama's Sashin yo Sayonara / Bye Bye Photography (Shashin Hyoron-sha, 1972which reproduce some of the photographs published in Provoke and contrast completely with the pre-existing photographic language, leaving aside the technique, for the energy of the moment, and sometimes violence or banality.

-          Karasu / Ravens / Solitude of Ravens by Masahisa Fukaseoriginally published in 1986 by Sokyusha, then Bedford Arts / Chronicle Books, 1991, then Rat Hole, 2008 and finally Mack, 2017. A book on the mourning of a relationship break up, on the return to his origins to find a meaning in life, and the raven as an omen, an augur, as a symbol of distress and melancholy.