Solomon-Godeau, Abigail. Photography at the Dock:
Essays on Photographic History, Institutions, and Prac-
tices. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1994.
Wallis, Brian, ed.Art after Modernism: Rethinking Repre-
sentation. Boston: David R. Godine, 1984.NOBUYOSHI ARAKI
Japanese
Tokyo-based Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi
Araki has gained worldwide notoriety for his can-
didly erotic pictures. Perhaps the most prolific photo-
grapher in the history of the medium, Araki is
the author of more than 200 books, and his exhibi-
tions often include thousands of images. A self-styled
‘‘photo-maniac,’’ photography is a lifestyle for Araki;
he shoots many, sometimes dozens of rolls of film a
day. Best known for his voyeuristic, snapshot-style
images of women often tied up with ropes (kinbaku)
and colorful, sensual flowers, Araki has used photo-
graphy to interpret emotions and experience.
Born in Tokyo, Araki was given a camera at the
age of 12 by his father. In 1963, he graduated from
the engineering department at Chiba University,
majoring in photography and cinema. He went
into commercial photography soon after graduat-
ing, working at the advertising company Dentsu in
- During his nine years there, he also pursued
his own projects. In 1964 he received the Taiyo
prize forSatchin(1963), a black and white photo-
graphic series featuring kids from downtown
Tokyo, whose title derives from the pet name of a
little girl. He exhibited these works and others in
his first exhibition in 1965.
In 1970 Araki created the first of hisXerox photo
albums, which he produced in a limited edition and
sent to friends, art critics, and people randomly
selected from the phone book. The quality of this
early type of photocopy often led to unusual tonal
effects in the resulting images. In 1971, he pub-
lished the privately printed photographic collection
Sentimental Journey (Senchimentaru na tabi),in
which his personal life, in particular his wedding
and honeymoon with Yoko Aoki, was displayed in
a diary format. At first glance the images seem to
be naı ̈ve records but they are in fact staged.Senti-
mental Journeyestablished Araki’s reputation, and
in 1972 he left Dentsu and became a freelance
photographer. Since then, almost all his works
have revolved around his own life, and are almost
always about the women who are close to him.
Stylistically, Araki has never been a purist. He
works in black and white and color, using ciba-
chrome as well as color photocopies for their gar-
ishness and artificiality; he uses natural light and
hard flash. Araki has also employed many experi-
mental techniques and processes including collage,
montage, solarization, and hand-applied color,
including paint (one series presents paint dripped
onto close-up images of vaginas). He also works
with negatives that are damaged or decayed, and
scratches into the emulsion on finished prints, such
as in a series where he scratched out the genitals on
nudes. He juxtaposes snapshots with studio pho-
tos, portraits, and street scenes, and still lifes with
hardcore pornography. He photographs voracious-
ly, from the female body to food to cats. Araki
works primarily with a Pentax 67 format cam-
era, dating the resulting prints to register them in
time; in his ongoingTokyo diariesAraki uses a
camera that automatically prints the date on the
image. Reflecting the nature of how he shoots, his
work is presented and is best understood in the
context of the series.
Araki’s work is paradoxical in that it is subjec-
tive and yet makes no claim to photographic truth;
he often appears in scenes containing sexual activ-
ity, yet one of his best known images is a self-
portrait wearing his recently deceased wife’s pink
coat, gripping a large black-and-white framed por-
trait of her. For Araki, an everyday street scene
may become transformed into a setting of intimate
revelation. Particularly preoccupied with female
sexuality, Araki attempts to become more intimate
with women through photography, claiming the
ropes he uses replicate an embrace. However critics
argue that the photographer’s objectification of hisARAKI, NOBUYOSHI