Shomei Tomatsu

(January, 16, 1930 – December, 14 2012)

Shōmei Tōmatsu (en japonés 東松 照明 ),was a Japanese photographer who stood out for his social reporting. He studied economics at the University of Aichi while learning photography in a self-taught way, after finishing his studies he started working at Iwanami Shoten publishing house. In 1959 he founded The Vivo Agency with Ikkō Narahara and Eikoh Hosoe.

Shomei Tomatsu was a young entrepreneur in a more than hostile context. A ‘rare avis’ that would be easier to observe today than not in the post-atomic Japan where it started firing. At the age of 20, while completing his studies in economics, the young Tomatsu learned photography in a self-taught way. It is the beginning of a personal story that, at the same time, is the history of Japanese photography.

His work was focused on social reporting as a criticism of the loss of the values of Japanese society against American influence. On the formal level he made an innovation in documentary photography by using symbolic images in his series. He has published numerous books.

He has exhibited his work all over the world and his work can be found in the Metropolitan Museum of Photography in Tokyo, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery of Canada, the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco and the Corcoran Gallery of Art.

Some of his photographs