Size: H245mm × W255mmPage: 248 pagesBinding: Hardcover
Contents---------------------------
7 Days
41 SELF AND OTHERS
109 SPIRITUAL TRAVELS
133 FAMILIAR STREET SCENES
189 Memories of Water
209 Childhood
217 Essay and References
ChronologyList of WorksAcknowledgements
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Gocho was born in 1946 in Kamo-shi, Niigata Prefecture. After graduating from high school, he went on to Kuwasawa Design School in Tokyo where he encountered photography, the medium that would become his lifelong artistic pursuit. Gocho lived in Japan during the period of rapid economic growth, up until just before the bubble economy.
In recounting Gocho's life, it is impossible to ignore the physical handicap that led to his premature death from heart failure in 1983. At the age of three, he was diagnosed with caries of the thoracic vertebrae, and the attending physician doubted he would live to see the age of twenty. Considering the physical demands of taking and developing photographs, it must have required considerable determination for Gocho to move to Tokyo alone and pursue photography.
Gocho's notebooks from that period reveal that in "SELF AND OTHERS," he was also attempting to explore themes of "death." While photographs directly addressing "death" were ultimately not included, one could argue that the photograph of a young girl lying with her eyes closed in a stark white room, or the final photograph in S&O, come close.
The final photograph in S&O, which also graces the cover of this photobook, was taken at a fireworks display for an Independence Day celebration at Camp Zama, a U.S. Army base, or perhaps during a Bon Festival Dance. Viewed in isolation, the location appears intentionally obscured. Amidst a fog-filled expanse, some children are running away while others run towards them. One might infer that, just before direct contact with "others," the child's ego or self has not yet solidified and remains in a state of flux. Gocho's decision to place this image on the photobook's cover signifies both anticipation and apprehension regarding the impending journey of encountering "others."
Furthermore, the children who have crossed the white line seem to inhabit a realm entirely separate from our own. Undoubtedly, if we trace back to the stage preceding the formation of the self through encounters with others, we eventually arrive at the world that exists before "life" itself emerges.
What is striking is that Gocho's depiction of this is never tragic. On the contrary, what exists before everything begins is a chaos brimming with potential. This perspective on life and death would undoubtedly have informed his subsequent concept for "Old Age." [...]
Looking back at Gocho's body of work, it feels like a series of trial-and-error attempts to grasp the dynamics of borders or "edges" that exist between two entities. For instance, the "edges" of contact between two cultures or two eras. The "edge" that arises from the encounter between two individuals, or the "edges" confronted by young people navigating urban life. Gocho's photographic works demonstrate that the experience of various "edges" can be discovered in fleeting, spontaneous facial expressions and gestures.
The re-evaluation of Gocho's work commenced in the late 1980s and continues to this day. This ongoing re-evaluation is not solely attributable to Gocho's personal narrative but also to the profound resonance that the allusions to various social phenomena and "edges" depicted in his works evoke within people at a fundamental level.
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