Slipcased embossed hardcover
ISBN:
Which art books, prints and posters are available by and about this artist? Here is a sample of items of interest to a typical collector:
Satomi Nihongi Japanese b. 1947
Nihongi is widely recognized for her intimate and unflinching documentation of youth culture, street fashion, and musical subcultures.
In the early 1970s, Nihongi became a notable observer of Tokyo’s shifting social landscape, documenting the city's transgender community and emerging street trends. During this period, she was associated with the influential and radical Japanese photographic collective "Geribara 5," which famously included Nobuyoshi Araki. Her landmark project from this era, later compiled in the 2021 monograph '70s Tokyo Long Hair Inverted, captured hundreds of deadpan, high-contrast street portraits of Japanese youth sporting long hair. This work served as a vital record of changing attitudes and fashions, with several of the images originally published in 1971 in the vibrant, avant-garde Japanese magazine Hanashi-no-Tokushu.
In the late 1970s, Nihongi relocated to London just as the punk rock movement was exploding. Working for the French music magazine Rock Hebdo, she captured the raw energy of the scene between 1977 and 1979. Her intimate, spontaneous portraits documented the dynamic interactions between performers and fans, capturing legendary figures like Sid Vicious, Iggy Pop, and Elvis Costello during a period of massive cultural upheaval.
Today, her vintage prints and recent re-publications, including the restored edition of Punk Rock in London, stand as critical historical archives, celebrated for their close, authentic gaze into defining moments of 20th-century subculture.
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70s Tokyo Long Hair Inverted collects a striking series of street portraits capturing shifting youth fashion and hairstyle trends on the streets of Tokyo during the early 1970s, focusing specifically on the emergence of long hair styles.
Drawn from a trove of high-contrast vintage prints, the book features deadpan, front-and-back black-and-white street portraits reproduced directly alongside their inverted negative counterparts, creating a graphic mirror effect of silhouettes and textures.
Nihongi, who was part of Tokyo's early 1970s photography scene and associated with collectives like Geribara 5,documented the counterculture, alternative fashion, and underground communities developing during a period of rapid urban change in Japan.
Originally partially featured in the influential Japanese counterculture magazine Hanashi-no-Tokushu in 1971, the complete body of work was brought together decades later in limited, slipcased hardcover edition.