Kikuji Kawada
Kikuji Kawada / The Map
HC in slipcase, 16 x 23 cm., 200 pp., translation
of original text.
Nazraeli 2005
"Kawada came of age during the era of postwar reconstruction in Japan. He finished his degree in economics at the Rikkyo Univeristy in Tokyo and is a self-taught photographer. After school, in 1955, he went to work as a staff photographer for the publishing house Shinchosa. He quit after four years to go freelance. He was one of the founding members of the Vivo Agency, along with Shomei Tomatsu and Eikoh Hosoe, among others.
Common themes in his work are the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japanese political consciousness and national symbols, and, the aftermath of war in Japan." SKJ-
Which is a nice understatement. Since, with The Map Kawada published one of the most haunting, important photobooks, a solitary expression that implodes into black.