Kazuyoshi Usui’s Fantasy Japanese Society

On 1st May 2019, Japan left the Heisei era and entered Reiwa. From 1926 to 1989, however, the country was living in the Showa era, corresponding to the reign of the emperor Hirohito, known as Showa Tenno. Born in 1975 in Tokyo, the photographer Kazuyoshi Usui has based his work on the following premise: what if the Showa era never ended? 

This fictional imagining takes the form of a trilogy – Showa 88 (2011), Showa 92 (2015), and Showa 96 (2019). The images taken by the artist include portraits, day-to-day scenes, landscapes, and interiors illustrating the period famed as the miracle of the Japanese economy. 

Creating a fantasy world

According to the artist and curator Miki Nitadori — who presented the series as part of the exhibition Anti-chambre Acte 2 in Paris in 2020 —  ‘Kazuyoshi Usui brings together images that give birth to a fantasised vision of Japan like that seen from abroad. While those born in Japan after the war might recognise some of the elements in the shot, this is not the Showa era they know from the films of the 1970s or TV programmes of the 80s.’

Kazuyoshi Usui explains that his desire is to avoid expressing pure nostalgia within his work, and to instead create a fantasy world.  

Showa 88 (2011), Showa 92 (2015), and Showa 96 (2019) by Kazuyoshi Usui are published by the Zen Foto Gallery.