Last year marked the 20th annual “New Cosmos of Photography”, a competition started in 1991 by Canon Camera in an effort to identify young, emerging photographic artists deserving of our attention. Judged by a combination of working photographers and critics (Nobuyoshi Araki, Daido Moriyama, and Kotaro Iizawa are among those who have judged the competition in the past), this year saw 25 award winners from among 1,276 entrants in a competition judged by photographers Katsumi Omori, Masafumi Sanai, and Mika Ninagawa, and critics Minoru Shimizu and Noi Sawaragi (each judge chooses one Excellent Award winner and five Honorable Mentions).

The following gallery of images from Kazuyasu Matsui’s Paradise☆INGA (one of Omori’s Honorable Mention picks) is our third gallery from the 2010 competition.

“Every day, in the area of the small town in the mountains where I live, I take photographs while going about my job as a milkman. On my days off, I head deeper into the mountains or to the sea, camping or sleeping in my car, and taking photos. When I’m shooting, it often feels like those days when I was in grade school, and enjoying summer vacation just playing out in nature. “If only every day could be like summer vacation,” I think to myself. Shooting photographs gives me that kind of feeling, and I end up choosing photographs that show more than I have aimed for.”

— Kazuyasu Matsui