ANTI-WAR PROTEST
(JAPANESE PROTEST BOOK).
10.21 to ha nanika [What is October 21st?].
[Tokyo]: (The 10.21 to hananika Publishing Committee), [1969].
8vo (210 × 150 mm), pp.[96]. 79 black-and-white photographs. Black-and-white photo-illustrated wrappers, printed in red and black. Fine, and scarce as such.
First edition. In the late 1960s, the student protest movement reached its peak in Japan, and a number of remarkable books were published during this period. 10.21 to hananika is particularly valuable as a social and historical record because it was created by the students themselves. The title refers to the nationwide rally on 21, October 1968 to mark International Anti-War Day. The demonstrations were highly coordinated and took place in over 500 locations in close to 50 cities throughout Japan. 10.21 to hananika includes photographs taken by students at these events together with others taken during various student movement activities throughout 1967-68. A chronology places the student demonstrations together with key international events such as the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., the death of Che Guevara, workers’ strikes in Germany, and student protests in France.
‘The design of these books combines descriptive detail with disorienting juxtapositions and elusive images produced in the heat of battle, often at night, using rudimentary equipment. The result is an aesthetic of bodily immersion, nervous movement, the disorientation of smoke, and the flare of fire. This has less to do with neo-avant-garde positioning ... than it does an effort to find a way of visualizing the working existence of violent protest, the structure of feeling of constituent politics. The protest book aims both to feed the mind and dazzle the senses in order to communicate the intoxicating experience of revolution’ (Forbes 240).
Kaneko, R. and Vartanian, I., Japanese Photobooks of the 1960s and ‘70s pp.144-9; Parr, M. and Badger, G., The Photobook: A History vol.III p.59; Forbes, D. et al, Provoke: Between Protest and Performance / Photography in Japan 1960-1975 pp.102-109; Kaneko, R. and Heiting, M. The Japanese Photobook, 1912-1990 (199).
