(Shigeo Gocho) (Works)

Kyoto: Akaakasha, 2022
Condition: New, 1st edition, 24.5x 25.5cm, 248 pages, Hardcover

Shipped from Germany. No,return.

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 the photograph, the tool that was to be his means of artistic expression for his entire life. Gocho lived in Japan from the period of rapid economic growth until just before the onset of the bubble economy.
In relating Gocho's life, I must inevitably mention the physical handicap that was the cause of his premature death from heart failure in 1983. When he was 3 years old, he was diagnosed with caries of the thoracic vertebrae and the attending physician expressed doubt that he would live to the age of 20. For Gocho, it must have required a certain amount of determination to move to Tokyo alone and pursue photography in light of the physical effort required to take and develop photographs.
Because of this, Gocho must have been constantly aware of the time he had left. For about 16 of the 36 years of his life, he lived with vigor and enthusiasm side-by-side with the artistic medium of photography, all the while dealing with his physical condition. He left a legacy of three photograph collections and one book of artwork along with contact prints, notebooks, and memo books that were the source of the works.
A photographer who died prematurely but lived life with courage and determination in spite of his handicap--when this history is brought to the foreground, the language used to relate his life tends to take on a dramatic color. And it is true that Gocho's early life and physical handicap did have an influence on his art, so it would probably be difficult to completely hold back such a reaction. [...]
Having said that, how does one go about relating a story you are compelled to tell? I would like to approach Gocho's life by taking a detailed look back on the legacy of works he left us and the times in which he lived.