Hiroshi Watanabe -- Love Point::Suo Sarumawashi::Ideology in Paradise::"I see angels every day"::Kabuki Players::Japanese Studies::Northern Places::Species Among Us
posted by vronsky on Nov 13, 2009 - 6 comments

Urban exploration Japan: abandoned mining town. Step into the doctor's office for a dose of creepy. Three-part photo essay. [more inside]
posted by planetkyoto on Nov 28, 2008 - 19 comments

A blog about Japanese photography seen from abroad. [more inside]
posted by chunking express on Nov 3, 2008 - 2 comments

Tsukiji knife photos by Tony McNicol. List of published articles. List of selected photo galleries. I’ve been taking photos of a 240 year old knife shop in Tsukiji fish market.... If you buy a knife at the shop you can bring it back to be sharpened for free. [more inside]
posted by KokuRyu on Oct 1, 2008 - 14 comments

Vintage 3-D stereoviews of old Japan, Meiji and Taisho era swimsuit girls, working people, geisha, and kids, old Japan salt prints, dozens of T. Enami glass slides, and strange or offbeat images: all part of a vast and superb collection of Japanese photos from 1862 to 1930 by flickr user Okinawa Soba. [more inside]
posted by madamjujujive on Sep 9, 2008 - 17 comments

Paradise: The Gardens of Tokyo. A collection of amazing photographs of Japanese gardens as taken by Tim Porter. [more inside]
posted by Effigy2000 on Apr 10, 2008 - 6 comments

Iwase Yoshiyuki "In the late 1920s, young Yoshiyuki received an early Kodak camera as a gift. Since the main livelihood of the town came from the sea, he gravitated there, and soon found a passion for "the simple, even primitive beauty" of ama – girls and women who harvested seaweed, turban shells and abalone from beneath the coastal waters." "By the late 1960s, they had disappeared. This body of work stands as the final, most comprehensive visual document of the life and work of these divers." [NSFW] [more inside]
posted by tellurian on Mar 27, 2008 - 48 comments

Bert Teunissen - Domestic Landscapes. Photographs of (mostly) senior citizens in their living rooms and kitchens. [more inside]
posted by ceiriog on Mar 25, 2008 - 17 comments

Japanese places and people photographed by Felice Beato, a pioneer 19th century photographer who documented the Crimean War, the Indian Mutiny and the Anglo-French military intervention in China before opening a studio in Yokohama in 1863. He also seems to have been the first photographer in Korea.Wikipedia NYPL archive First two links are units in MIT's Visualizing Cultures project.
posted by Abiezer on Jan 23, 2008 - 12 comments

Lost Places in Japan
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken on Nov 12, 2007 - 27 comments

"What is so striking about the work is that EVERYONE is crossing a line: The couples who are engaged in sex in public, the Peeping Toms who trespass on that intimacy, the photographer who has betrayed his acquaintance's trust, and of course US -- so willing to look at what was not meant for us to see." See also: NYTimes slideshow Layers of Voyeurism (Via boingboing) SFW, IMHO
posted by spock on Sep 25, 2007 - 20 comments

Some amazing photos of the storm sewer system in Tokyo. (Further reading)
posted by dersins on Sep 4, 2007 - 26 comments

Quicktime panoramas of Kyoto
posted by carter on Jun 30, 2007 - 12 comments

A nice set of photographic glass-plate transparencies depicting life in Japan ca. 1910. These "Yokohama photographs" were sold to foreign tourists between about 1868 and 1912. I found the Crafts and Trades section most interesting.
posted by Rumple on Jun 7, 2007 - 18 comments

Bakumatsu - from this to this. Photographs from an exhibition at the University of Tokyo. [related]
posted by tellurian on Jun 6, 2007 - 7 comments

The Walter Pennino Photo Collection of the Occupation of Japan. Eighty photographs of Japan under Allied occupation taken around 1948, from children enjoying a picture-card show, to fishermen, to repatriated soldiers. (Follow the "pic index" link on the front page to see the thumbnail images.)
posted by sudasana on May 4, 2007 - 14 comments

Photos from Hiroshima in August of 1945. Long supressed by the occupying U.S. forces, a highly unsettling (and decidedly NSFW) collection of photos from the days immediately after August 6th. Via.
posted by jonson on Feb 6, 2007 - 199 comments

The old and the new Japan in one frame. The delicate relationship of Oyako, parent and child. In 1982 American photographer Bruce Osborn began what has become his lifelong work. For the last 25 years he took pictures of one parent with one child in a white studio setting.
posted by nickyskye on Feb 1, 2007 - 28 comments

Amazing collection of several galleries full of Japanese "urban ruins" photos, including abandoned amusement parks, refineries, apartment blocks, hospitals, schools, bowling alleys, & much more, including Battleship Island, the (previously posted) abandoned coal mining island off the coast of Nagasaki. Via.
posted by jonson on Dec 5, 2006 - 34 comments

Quicktime VR photos of Tokyo - tunnels - night - large drains - buildings - etc. The nav is mainly in Japanese but the "VR List" link, lower right, seems to be the main index.
posted by carter on Jul 26, 2006 - 9 comments

Joe Nishizawa's new photojournalism book, Deep Inside, is a visual exploration of the amazing, highly mechanized world under Japan's urban areas. This brief interview with the author is accompanied by several interesting photos.
posted by jonson on Jul 24, 2006 - 18 comments

Howard French - Asia photos Photos from across Asia by Howard French, who works for the New York Times. Includes many photos of the 'Disappearing Shanghai' that is being obliterated by the city's relentless urbanization.
posted by carter on May 29, 2006 - 6 comments

Avenue is a site of a snap photograph. Please enjoy it slowly. Here's a Japanese site of exquisite photographs. And lest I be accused of self-posting, let me say for the record that I neither took nor posed for the photos in the Orange Swan series.
posted by orange swan on May 3, 2006 - 8 comments

The Digital Silk Roads Project continues to grow apace with more additions from the Toyo Bunko rare books archive. Now available online, among others, are Les grottes de Touen-Houang, The Thousand Buddhas and several German books, including Chotscho. Unfortunately, all of the high resolution images are greyscale. [related]
posted by tellurian on May 1, 2006 - 5 comments

Outside staircases. Doors. Stacks of stuff. People sleeping outside. And more. Mainly in Yokohama. Photographs by Tom Gally.
posted by Slithy_Tove on Oct 11, 2005 - 9 comments

The Peleliu Project. The tiny Micronesian island of Peleliu was the site of one of the bloodiest battles of World War II. The U.S. invasion of the Japanese occupied island began in September of 1944, and was expected to last only a matter of days. Casualties on this 5 square mile island reached 20,000 by the end of the two-month struggle. U.S. soldiers were forced to pour aviation fuel into caves and ignite them in order to end the standoff of those who refused to surrender. One determined group of 34 Japanese soldiers remained in hiding until they were discovered in April of 1947.
Pharmacist Mate 3rd Class Russell Fee returned from Peleliu with a fierce, uncompromising vision of America which would have a profound impact on the life and work of his son. Fifty-three years later, armed with his father's snapshots and diary which he had just uncovered, James Fee went to Peleliu to see with his own eyes the place where his father's vision had taken shape. The result of his five year quest is The Peleliu Project. more inside
posted by matteo on Aug 21, 2005 - 13 comments

Tsuga Recreational Area: abandoned Japanese amusement park photos (translation here).
posted by moonbird on Apr 30, 2005 - 30 comments

A Tale of Two Chinas, by photographer James Whitlow Delano. Whole swaths of cities have vanished, to be transformed with developments that have quickly made them look more like Houston, Qatar, or Singapore than the ancient China of our mind's eye. The old hutong, or alleyways, of Beijing that once formed a mosaic of passageways and the siheyuan, or walled courtyard houses, have been largely razed. The old brick rowhouses of Shanghai, are now being leveled and replaced by modern high-rises. Traditional marketplaces, residential neighborhoods, streets where medicine shops or bookstores bunched together, are now either gone or have been rouged up as tourist destinations, part of a new synthetic, virtual version of China's incredible past. The energy fueling this transformation bespeaks a powerful but often blind, unquestioning faith in an inchoate idea of progress that takes one's breath away, often literally. (Unrestrained growth has left China with the dubious honor of having 9 of the 10 most polluted cities in the world). Delano's new book is "Empire: Impressions from China". More inside.
posted by matteo on Feb 17, 2005 - 23 comments

Misty Keasler's photographic essays range from quirky views of her east Texas extended family and Japanese love hotels to unsettling essays on orphanages and the Guatemala City dump. flash. via gordon.coale.
posted by madamjujujive on Jan 26, 2005 - 12 comments

Harajuku Street Style. Oh those crazy cool Japanese kids! The streets of Harajuku are as much a fashion playground as they are an exhibit of Why You Should Never Pair White Boots with Gold Chains. This is, of course, in line with the existing weirdness of the brilliant Katamari Damacy, mayonnaise-and-squid pizza, and the "no caption required" homoerotic dating sim "le, Tatemasu!",
posted by riffraff on Jan 7, 2005 - 34 comments

Night Windows Gorgeous images of night-time urban Japan (Japanese titles, English alt tags, 1024x768 images available). Includes: sleeping bullet trains, trams, cats, Tokyo Harbour tunnel, bridges, tail lights, Narita airport, offices, Mount Fuji, Tokyo Disneyland (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), and many more.
posted by carter on Nov 10, 2004 - 13 comments

Masamania. Not safe for work! 'Hi, this is masamania who create this page, MasaManiA.com. This page is made up of photos I actually take in twon. .I hope I can show and tell you the real, true Japan that cannot be seen in other mas media. I am living in Tokyo, Japan. I was born in Japan, grown up in Japan, study English in Japan. This is the reason I can speak Engrish. Some people complain that my updating and email response is slow. And other people conplain that my englsih is poor. '
posted by plep on Oct 24, 2004 - 13 comments

Memories of a Dog . Moriyama Daido's pictures are taken in the streets of Japan's major cities. Made with a small, hand-held camera, they reveal the speed with which they were snapped. Often the frame is tilted vertiginously, the grain pronounced, and the contrast emphasized. Among his city images are those shot in underlit bars, strip clubs, on the streets or in alleyways, with the movement of the subject creating a blurred suggestion of a form (warning: NSFW images if you scroll down the page) rather than a distinct figure. His best known picture, Stray Dog, (1971) is taken on the run, in the midst of bustling street activity. It is an essential reflection of Moriyama's presence as an alert outsider in his own culture. Moriyama is also a toy-camera enthusiast (his favorite is the Polga) . He has worked in the US, too: "N.Y. 71". (more inside)
posted by matteo on Sep 27, 2004 - 6 comments

Asia Grace
posted by euphorb on Jul 21, 2004 - 6 comments

Museum of Park Slide.
posted by hama7 on Jul 8, 2004 - 14 comments

360 photographs of Allied-occupied Japan after World War Two, taken by anthropologist John W. Bennett, arranged in portfolios with comments by Bennett and links to large images, such as hotel umbrellas drying in the sun. The exhibition includes selections from Bennett's journal and letters with his first impressions of Japan. Portfolios include views of Tokyo, children in the park, women of the night, traditional architecture, and Japanese resorts.
posted by carter on Apr 11, 2004 - 5 comments

Manabu Yamanaka Photographs. [view with caution]
posted by hama7 on Apr 9, 2004 - 6 comments

Japanese Old Photographs from the Bakumatsu-Meiji Period (1860-1899).
posted by hama7 on Mar 25, 2004 - 11 comments

The Kamagasaki Gallery. Background to and photographs of a Japanese slum.
posted by plep on Mar 2, 2004 - 10 comments

Kazumi Namiki uses a slit camera to capture panoramic pictures onto a whole roll of film. He uses his slit camera to take photographs of Japanese railway trains; lots and lots of trains. [via boingboing]
posted by carter on Jan 12, 2004 - 9 comments

Shinsato: Great vacant night cityscapes of Osaka and Tokyo.
posted by hama7 on Jan 2, 2004 - 11 comments

Welcome to ArtServe: Art & Architecture mainly from the Mediterranean Basin and Japan.
posted by hama7 on Nov 29, 2003 - 7 comments

Yoshikazu Iwahashi Photograph.
posted by hama7 on Nov 4, 2003 - 10 comments

Night View of Seto - impressive panoramas of western Japan. (via Yakitori)
posted by madamjujujive on Nov 1, 2003 - 12 comments

A Year in the Life of a Kyoto Neighbourhood. Actually, more like about six months, but still a worthwhile project.
Related :- the Play of Light, Kyoto and Nepal at night.
Also :- seasons in the Natural History Museum garden, London.
posted by plep on Jul 1, 2003 - 4 comments

Gods of Japan. A photo-dictionary. 'This photo library and dictionary is a labor of love. After moving to Kamakura in 1993, I became intrigued by the many deities and faces of Buddhism and Shintoism. There are over 650 photos in this library ... '
Related :- Quirky Japan. This site is just fabulous. 'Are you tired of shrines and temples, reconstructed ferro-concrete castles and tea ceremonies? Do you like to get off the beaten track? Would you like to meet Japanese people who do not meet the conformist stereotype? Japan, behind the conservative grey suits and formal bows, is a country quirkier than you can ever imagine. The Quirky Japan Homepage provides information about oddities such as the The Meguro Parasitalogical Museum, the Thousand Person Bathtub, Love Hotels, temple lodging, and the Yakiimo man (the ice cream man's evil twin). '
Related interest :- Lost Japan. Here's an interesting interview with the author, Alex Kerr; and here's a piece about his wonderful house.
posted by plep on Apr 23, 2003 - 14 comments

Striking, panoramic photo collages of the ruins of U.S. and Canadian concentration camps used to isolate Japanese-Americans during WWII. Masumi Hayashi's rich site also features documents, personal stories and Shockwave interview clips, a discussion board and data on each camp. And, yes, this post was inspired by U.S. Congressman Howard Coble's recent comment.
posted by mediareport on Feb 6, 2003 - 34 comments

"I'm not alive. I'm not myself. I'm tired of playing the role of somebody else. I want to be myself".
Kamagasaki, Japan in the 1950s: photographs by Inoue Seiryu, and Kamagasaki now: Photos and text by Shannon Higgins, with first-hand accounts and translations.[more]
posted by hama7 on Jan 21, 2003 - 14 comments