For a Language to Come

by Takuma Nakahira

A near-facsimile reproduction (the cover is redesigned) of the classic 1970 Japanese photo Takuma Nakahira. One hundred black and white photographs, with an English translation of 3 texts by Nakahira laid in.

Genres: Photography, Art, Japan

160 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1970

About the author

Takuma Nakahira is a Japanese photographer and photography critic.

While working as an editor at the art magazine Today's Focus (Gendai no me), Nakahira published his work under the name of Aki Yuzuki. Up through the publication of the phonebook For a Language to Come (Kitarubeki kotoba no tame ni) in 1970, Nakahira had been well versed in a style in the vein of Daido Moriyama's Are, bure, boke (rough, blurred, and out of focus). In 1973, he published Why an Illustrated Botanical Dictionary (Naze, shokubutsu zukan ka), shifting away from the style of Are, bure, boke and instead moving towards a type of catalog photography stripped of the sentimentality of handheld, or a photography resembling the illustrations of reference books.

Reviews

[Jeff Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite photography books. The images are purposefully grainy, full of fathomless blacks and irradiated whites, composed using blown out contrasts that flirt with overexposure. A collection of defamiliarized Tokyo landscapes and residents from the late 1960s, it's nothing short of visionary. Nakahira was one of the founders of the radical Provoke magazine and this was the most extreme manifestation of that all too short-lived movement. Beautifully reprinted by Osiris Books, this edition contains four lucid English language essays that outline the reasons and ramifications of his "year zero" approach to picture taking. Overly romantic but necessary sidenote: Shortly after finishing this book, Nakahira temporarily lost his sight and later suffered from a severe bought of amnesia.

[Brian · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is a masterpiece of post war japanese photography. really the heartbeat of the provoke vision. and this osiris reprint has fantastic plates!

[Vogisland · Rating 5 out of 5]

Almost as good as Takanashi Yutaka's Toshi-e (this is a much better edition than the Errata reprint of Tosh-e). Nakahira employs the same methods (extreme contrast and grit) as Moriyama Daido but his sensibility is relatively less earthy and more spectral / haunted. Subjects such as a ship belching black smoke, a florist, and the ceiling of a train station have turned absolutely demonic in these photos.