First major retrospective in nearly twenty years of a legendary photographer who changed Japanese photography

Nakahira Takuma (1938–2015) was a photographer who made a significant mark in both production and theory from the late 1960s to the mid-1970s, a turning point in postwar Japanese photography. His presence has greatly inspired photographers of his generation, such as Moriyama Daido and Shinoyama Kishin, and has also had a profound influence on succeeding generations, including Homma Takashi. Nakahira’s career is marked by dramatic episodes: the intense images of are, bure, boke (grainy, blurry, out-of-focus) published in Provoke magazine and other publications in the late 1960s; his self-criticism and declaration of directional change in his 1973 collection of writings Why an Illustrated Botanical Dictionary?; and his coma and amnesia in 1977, and his recovery. While these narratives highlighted Nakahira’s presence, however, they also fixed his image and obscured the details of his work.

This exhibition will carefully trace Nakahara’s work and reexamine its development. In particular, it will focus on his work during the period of exploration that began around 1975 and ended in 1977 because of his illness and consider again the positioning of his work after his recovery.

Even after the photographer’s death in 2015, interest in his work has continued to grow both nationally and internationally. Presenting 400 works and materials spanning his entire career, this long-awaited exhibition traces the trajectory of Nakahira’s thinking and practice on photography, which still raises questions we cannot overlook even today.

Contents
Introduction: A Radical Ethos—Tracing the Arc of Nakahira Takuma’s Career
Masuda Rei (Curator of Photography, The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo)

Chapter I　For a Language to Come
Column 1　Tomatsu Shomei and Taki Koji
Column 2　Repeating Images

Chapter II　Landscapes, Cities and Circulation
Column 3　“Landscape Theory” and Eiga Hihyo
Column 4　Nakahira Takuma and Art

Chapter III　An Illustrated Botanical Dictionary and Overflow
Column 5　Nakahira Takuma and Asahi Journal
Column 6　1973, An Experience of Perceptual Irregularity

Chapter IV　Islands and the Streets
Column 7　Nakahira Takuma’s Theory of the Photographer

Chapter V　Degree Zero of Photograph
Column 8　Changes in Portraits

Chapter VI　Installation View

Chapter VII　Texts
Text 1: Nakahira’s Circulation
Matthew S. Witkovsky (Richard and Ellen Sandor Chair and Curator of Photography and Media, and Vice President for Strategic Art Initiatives at the Art Institute of Chicago)
Text 2: Yasumi Akihito
Text 3: Kuraishi Shino

Chapter VIII　Data
Data 1: Chronology
Data 2-01: List of Publications
Data 2-02: List of Related Publications
Data 3: Exhibition Checklist