As many of you are no doubt aware, there is a wealth of wonderful photography books being published every year in Japan. Trouble is, they don’t come cheap, whether you are lucky enough to find them on your side of the world or you order them from places like the Japan Exposures bookstore, especially when shipping costs are factored in. This makes it difficult for many people to take a chance on books by unknown photographers — and frankly that’s a shame. Recently I’ve been wondering if there isn’t more we here at Japan Exposures can be doing to, er, expose these books more.

This is the impetus for this video look at four new or recent publications, three of which are by photographers I feel comfortable in saying are unknown to the majority of our readership. All four books share in common the fact that the photographs were taken in the period of the 60s and 70s, and while each in its own right is a wonderful book, they seemed to resonate off of each other particularly well. In order of discussion, the four books featured in the above video are:

山襞村物語ー北上１９６３−１９７３
The Village Story: Kitagami, 1963-1973
Photographs by Hirokazu Ishida
Published in 2009 by Sokyusha (ltd. run of 700 copies); hardcover; 84 pages/77 plates (all b/w); 23cm x 24cm; includes English translations of afterword and photographer profile.

写真少年１９７３−１９７９
The Blue Period 1973-1979
Photographs by Akiyoshi Taniguchi
Published in 2009 by Sokyusha (ltd. run of 500 copies); hardcover (cloth) in slipcase; 64 pages/53 plates (all b/w); 23cm x 25cm; includes English translations of afterword and photographer profile.

Northern
Photographs by Daido Moriyama
Published in 2009 by Tosho Shinbun; softcover with obi; approx. 200 pages/190 plates (all b/w); 30cm x 21cm; Japanese text only; includes DVD (Japanese only) slideshow with brief footage of interview with Moriyama.

あの日の彼、あの日の彼女１９６７−１９７５
Photographs by Alao Yokogi
Published in 2006 by Ascom; softcover with obi; approx. 344 pages/320 plates (all b/w); 30cm x 21cm; essay in Japanese only (photo captions include English). (Unfortunately out of print. Please contact us if you would like us to try to find this book for you.)

(You can watch the above video in HD and/or at a larger size at Japan Exposure’s page at Vimeo.)