ARAKI. Nobuyoshi. Tokyo: Araki Nobuyoshi Shashinshu [Photobook] 3. (Tokyo): (Fukusha Shudan Geribara 5), (1973). -SIGNED BY ARAKI AND YOKO

(ARAKI. Nobuyoshi).
Tokyo: Araki Nobuyoshi Shashinshu [Photobook] 3.
(Tokyo): (Fukusha Shudan Geribara 5), (1973).

4to (257 × 130 mm), pp.[56]. 56 black-and-white photographs. Text by Köji Taki. Design by Katsumi Yutani. Pink endpapers. Side-stapled with printed wrappers, text in olive green; crease to head and foot at spine, short tear to spine towards foot,adhesive loosened at rear spine-fold but holding firm, lightly rubbed and foxed. Inscribed by Araki in black, and his wife Yoko in blue ink on first page, Yoko has additionally written their address to the verso of the front wrapper. Very good.

First edition, a presentation copy of one of Araki’s best books, inscribed and signed by both Araki and his late wife Yoko to Masakuzu Sakamoto.

Tokyo is the last in a series of three volumes which examine different aspects of everyday life, it was preceded by Sentimental Journey (1971) and Okinawa: Araki Nobuyoshi Photobook 2 [Sentimental Journey Continued] (1971). Here Araki juxtaposes two photographs, one flush above the other in a vertical layout, most of which show commuters crossing the streets of Tokyo paired with pictures of women posing nude or in compromising positions. ‘When these volumes are viewed collectively, it becomes clear that Araki is working out a series of related ideas across a number of different publications: the public versus the private, the role of the photographer as a reporter, the contrast of the specific and the general, ideas of locale and narrative, and the very function of a photobook’ (Kaneko & Vartanian).

The Fukushu-Shudan Geribara 5 [Diarrhoea-Shit Reproductive Collective of 5] flourished briefly in the early 1970s following the disbanding of the Provoke group. It consisted of Araki, Fukuo Ikeda, Tomoko ‘Miss Geribara’ Kamiguchi, Naohosia Tabogami, Yoshio Takase and Koji Yaehata. Collectively they published Benjo [Toilet] (1971), Mizugi no Yangu Redii-Tachi [Young Ladies in Bathing Suits] (1971, and Five Girls (1972).

Scarce, no copies in OCLC.

Iizawa, K., A Book of Araki Books! 1970-2005 pp.51-2 ; Araki, N., Self, Life, Death p.694; Kaneko, R. and Vartanian, I., Japanese Photobooks of the 1960s and ‘70s pp. 108-115.