The first photo essay in the collection, “Light and Shadow,” was published in the fall of 1981, marking Moriyama’s return to photography. “Much of ‘Light and Shadow’ is Daidō taking photographs of objects around the beach town of Zushi, and Tokyo and its suburbs,” Strettell and Susada write. “This image of the soda bottle was not one we were familiar with, symbolizing modern Japan and the influence of Western culture.”
Moriyama published this stark image of a horse in the snow in early 1984 as part of a series of photos themed around the seasons of a year. “He begins this chapter exploring the boundaries of Tokyo, then halfway through, documents a series of trips taken seasonally around Japan as a counterpoint to the capital city,” Strettell and Susada write. “This one is from a ‘Winter Trip’ to the northern island of Hokaido.”
“Yasui Nakaji was a leading light in the Japanese avant- garde that explored modernism and surrealism in the 1930s,” Strettell and Susada write, noting that Moriyama’s journey toward one of his artistic heroes in this photo essay was “a spiritual one.” “These photograms — a form of cameraless photography — refer to the work of the French surrealist Man Ray and his ‘Rayographs’ that would have influenced Nakaji,” they add.
“Daidō decided to quite literally document everything he came across for this chapter,” Strettell and Susada write. “Subjects varied wildly, from street photography to cars, insects, flowers, natural landscapes, and portraiture. The photo we selected here is an unknown one — taken in Shibuya, the busy neighborhood of Tokyo — that typifies the style of street photography he became known for at this time and into the Nineties.”
By 1987, Moriyama was back in prime form, even opening a private gallery in Shibuya. “In this chapter, published between December ’86 and February ’88, Daidō playfully explores all sorts of experimental aspects of photography,” Strettell and Susada write. “Like a puzzle, this is part of a series of crops from a single photograph with a large, complex composition…. The full photograph is revealed at the end of the essay.”
The final Shashin Jidai photo essay collected in the book has a quiet, reflective tone. “My photos are not outward messages toward others, nor are they made with the viewer in mind,” Moriyama wrote in 1988. “Ultimately, they are oriented toward myself.” Strettell and Susada describe this chapter as “an introspective set of essays and photographs, exemplified by this interior image of an unmade bed, with a sliver of open curtain.”