OTSUCHI FUTURE MEMORIES

Photobook "OTSUCHI FUTURE MEMORIES" by Argentinian photographer Alejandro CHASKIELBERG.

This collection of works was created between 2012 and 2015, set in Otsuchi-cho, Iwate Prefecture, which was severely damaged by the Great East Japan Earthquake. By superimposing recovered family photographs swept away by the tsunami with portraits of current residents living after the disaster, it quietly depicts memory and time, loss and regeneration.

For this work, CHASKIELBERG adopted a unique method: extracting the colors from damaged family photos recovered after the tsunami and overlaying them onto black-and-white portraits of current residents. Past memories and present appearances softly intersect within a single frame.

While the fantastical composition using long exposure and night photography is present in this work, it has a quieter, more introspective tone compared to "La Creciente." Although it records the disaster, it transcends mere disaster documentation, connecting to fundamental questions such as "What is photography?" and "What is memory?"

Highly acclaimed as a work that focuses not only on lost landscapes and buildings but also on "the loss of memory itself" that people carry, it received an Honorable Mention at the PhMuseum Photography Grant in 2015.

Daido Moriyama also praised it, saying, "Among the countless documentary films on the Great Earthquake that I have seen so far, it is an outstanding document."

A book that deeply questions the relationship between photography's documentary nature, its fantastical quality, and individual memory.

[Title] OTSUCHI FUTURE MEMORIES
[Publisher] Editorial RM
[Publication Date] 2016
[Pages] 112 pages
[Size] Approx. 250 x 200mm / 645g
[Format] Hardcover
[Language] English, Spanish, Japanese
[Title Reading] OTSUCHI FUTURE MEMORIES / OTSUCHI MIRAI NO KIOKU
[Author/Editor] Alejandro CHASKIELBERG / Author
[Printing] -
[ISBN] 9786078295326
[Condition] Used [6] Good to Very Good (Slight scuff on spine corner, slight smudge on front endpaper, slight dents on top and bottom edges)
[Accessories] Obi
[Featured In] -
[Related Exhibitions] -

Alejandro CHASKIELBERG (Born 1977)

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1977. Photographer.

After working as a photojournalist, he established a unique photographic expression using long exposures and artificial light. He gained international attention for works that traverse the boundaries between documentary and staging, reality and fantasy.

In his representative work "La Creciente," he fantastically depicted the daily lives of people living in Argentina's Paraná River Delta region using moonlight and long exposures. In 2011, he received the World Photographer of the Year award (Sony World Photography Awards).

In "OTSUCHI FUTURE MEMORIES," he explores the relationship between memory and photography by superimposing recovered family photos and current residents, taking Otsuchi-cho after the Great East Japan Earthquake as his subject. He is known for works that integrate social documentary and poetic expression.

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