A Documentary Examining Daido Moriyama’s Photographs

Released in 2019, Gen Iwama’s documentary The Past is Always New, The Future is Always Nostalgic: Photographer Daido Moriyama pays homage to the ‘godfather of Japanese street photography’ to mark his 80th birthday. 

An image hunter, Daido Moriyama was an integral figure in the post-war art scene. Having witnessed the changes in attitudes and customs in Japan, he shook up the established order with his black and white photographs that are blurry, grainy and high-contrast. Thus, for over a year, the director immersed himself in the uncharismatic photographer’s wanders around the city to retrace his legendary journey and reveal his methods of working. 

Fleeing his past

With a view to better understanding his iconic photographs, designer Satoshi Machiguchi and editor Yutaka Kambayashi stroll around the Japanese capital accompanied by the man himself, Daido Moriyama. During these encounters, however, the Ikeda native, cigarette hanging out of his mouth, does not appear enthusiastic at the prospect of looking back at his past glory. ‘They wouldn’t stop asking me where I took this photo or that photo, it was hell’, he protested to a speaker at an event. 

Always equipped with a modest camera, the eighty-something constantly captures whatever catches his attention. Skyscrapers, passers-by, shop fronts… A self-proclaimed ‘stray dog’, he mainly roams around Shinjuku, his favourite district. ‘I never get bored’, he tells the camera. 

Faced with a protagonist who is indifferent about his artistic heritage and people who are fascinated by his work and accomplishments, Gen Iwama identified the central conflict of his film. 

Rebirth of an art

In 1968, Daido Moriyama released Japan, A Photo Theater, a book dedicated to his black and white street photographs. To mark his fiftieth birthday, the book, which had been out of stock since its release, was reprinted. 

As such, the documentary goes hand in hand with the different stages in this second birth. ‘I tend to entrust the editing to someone else. It’s interesting to allow the gaze of other people to enter the process’, the photographer explained to Bomb Magazine. From the felling of trees to produce paper to the search for the perfect colour for the cover and the alignment when printing, no steps escape the camera. 

Nevertheless, this re-release remains at the periphery of the author who seeks to press ahead. ‘To do street photography, you have to continue to photograph. Taking street snapshots is meaningless unless you keep taking them. For me, life means photographing’, he revealed to the magazine Document Journal.

The Past is Always New, The Future is Always Nostalgic: Photographer Daido Moriyama (2019), a documentary directed by Gen Iwama and produced by Free Stone Productions Co, Ltd.