Oh! Shinjuku
- Tokyo: Shaken, 1969
Tokyo: Shaken, 1969. A remarkably well-preserved copy, with minor rubbing to illustrated wrappers, else near fine.. First Edition. Oblong quarto. Arguably Shomei Tomatsu's most important work, this dynamic portrait of Tokyo's Shinjuku district was published at the height of the New Left movement in Japan, with Tomatsu skillfully juxtaposing Shinjuku's traditional backdrop of corporate culture with countercultural scenes of sexual decadence and explosive street protests. The poetic text to rear cover stamps this as one of the great city photobooks: "Shinjuku is a modern jungle... a town that reeks of crime. Shinjuku is a town of night... a ghost of bloated desire that swallows everything. There are countless words that try to capture Shinjuku, but no matter how tightly you wrap the rope of language around it, it slips away with the speed of a loach" (our translation). (Parr / Badger, v1, 290).
Details
Title
Oh! Shinjuku
Author
TOMATSU, Shomei
Condition
Near Fine
Publisher
Tokyo: Shaken
Date
1969