Photographs from a small group of islands
Rainy season arrived late in Tokyo this year, but early summer definitely made its presence felt with higher than average temperatures and humidity rapidly reaching uncomfortable levels. In connection with that then, these are some street scenes taken over the last couple of weeks. A mixture in regards both ages and areas, with the only real constant holding them together being the conditions.
In Tokyo, old school taxis and their distinctive colours are rapidly disappearing, and those still in use are invariably plastered with ads, disrupting the beauty of their simple and appealing design. Seeing a completely unadorned one then is an increasingly rare occurrence, so to spot a pristine yellow model in wonderfully colour coordinated surroundings was absolutely lovely. A moment made even more special due to the fact that after taking this one photo, the cab set off and my camera’s battery promptly died.
That very recent shot also provides me with the perfect excuse to once again show some older, but similarly colourful frames from the past. A small set that I can hopefully continue to add to.
With no time to figure out what was going on, and almost no choice in the matter anyway, we were hurriedly bundled into this fella’s neighbourhood workshop so he could show us the small metallic items he stamps out on the room’s machines. There was also a homemade and wholly unorthodox money-box fashioned from a suitably empty whiskey bottle.
During his fast and chaotic explanations, along with a worryingly inebriated demonstration of how some of the machinery actually works, he said that having reached 80, the best things in life were his hobbies — chief among them being fishing, smoking and daytime drinking, although it’s probably safe to say they aren’t necessarily enjoyed in that order.
Then, just as quickly as we were dragged inside, the tour of sorts was over, and we were deposited back out onto the street. A brief and unexpected encounter in an area I know well, proving once again that it’s impossible to predict what’s round the next corner.
These photos were taken almost exactly 6 years ago, and as I was recently reminded of them, I decided to go back and both re-visit and re-edit some of what I originally shot.
The village was a combination of open, sealed and collapsed structures, and whereas some of them had been abandoned for 40 years or so, others were inhabited as comparatively recently as 2012. A mine closure in the area was the likely cause of people leaving in the 1980s, but signs of agriculture helps explain why other residents stayed on.
Those are the only real details we could glean, and even they are rather lacking. It was the same in regards any genuine information about the people who once lived there, except for what some of them looked like, and to a small degree, what their lives may have involved. Elements that together made the village the fascinating find it was, and also what prompted me to look back at the photos again, with the recent publication of an interview I did with Tokyo Weekender magazine being the initial catalyst.
In recent years quite a bit of my work has involved trying to capture moments and scenes that represent the before and after, all of which is covered in the article. And this village was probably the first time I properly documented (or at least properly understood) the power and importance of taking such photographs. The poignancy of faces staring back, along with the almost palpable silence of places that were once filled with people, voices and music are hard to ignore. Moments that while long gone, can now at least be imagined, which in a way allows them to be remembered once again.
I’ve mentioned my long-standing love of Shinjuku numerous times on these pages, as due to the interesting people and unexpected scenes it continues to conjure up, the area remains a firm favourite. The parts of Tokyo I’m drawn to on a much more regular basis, however, are those that provide ordinary, even mundane moments. Simple signs of everyday lives lived like they have been for generations, and ideally in environments that accentuate the passage of time.
Whether these photographs manage that is of course debatable, but for me at least they were interesting little vignettes that caught my eye on a morning photowalk last week.
In many ways this small, unassuming scene encapsulates the changing face of Tokyo, with the past slowly but surely making way for a more homogeneous present. A moment then to simply savour and enjoy before the steady encroachment of the demolition crew makes it seem like it never even existed at all.
