shashasha

“I don’t want to forget anything that happened.”
― Daisuke Tomizawa

Several pages into Daisuke Tomizawa’s “Yu-Kai (Wandering, Lingering)”, the series of snapshots begins to take on a strangely nostalgic atmosphere. It is as if every moment, every scene, even the asphalt of a seemingly unremarkable street, has special meaning presented in large format, the 170 color photographs seem to say: the world may not be beautiful, but it is precious.

“To feel nostalgic is to want to meet again; it’s the moment when the past and the present merge before our eyes (…)
It is inherently strange that someone else should feel nostalgic about Tomizawa’s photographs of streets or his friends. Why is there a sense of nostalgia for scenes we can’t have seen ourselves, as captured in his photographs? It can’t simply be explained by the unique effects of the colors or textures of film photography. ‘Yu-Kai’ manages to reach into the deep roots of nostalgia itself, to activate the primal mechanism of nostalgia in us living beings. I think that’s what characterizes Tomizawa’s photographs… They remind me of reading that the sense of nostalgia we feel when we see the sun set over the ocean triggers ancient memories recorded deep in our DNA.”
― from book designer Akitsu Sekkei’s statement (translation by shashasha)

The book contains an essay by Xue Xiaodan. Please note that all texts are only available in Japanese and Chinese.