DEAR OLD DAYS III
The final volume in Ryoji Akiyama’s trilogy on childhood in China, Dear Old Days III continues the journey begun with Dear Old Days (1983, reprinted 2019) and Dear Old Days II (2020).
Through carefully selected photographs made in the 1980s, Akiyama looks at childhood through the small details of everyday life, hand-knitted baby shoes, patterned towels, enamel bowls, open-air barbers, school clothes, and familiar domestic spaces. Alongside the children are the adults, homes, schools, and surroundings that quietly place these moments within a particular time and place.
Akiyama’s distinctive graphic compositions turn these ordinary scenes into photographs that are both playful and deeply observant. Rather than simply documenting childhood, the book reflects on how everyday objects and environments become markers of time.
The passage of time is also physically present in the photographs. Nine of the 119 images retain visible traces of mold that appeared on the original film. Rather than digitally removing these marks, Akiyama chose to leave them, describing them as “the imprint of the time passed.” The imperfections become part of the photographs’ histories.
The book also includes a conversation between Akiyama and Japanese photographer Hideaki Hamada, whose own work with children, including Haru And Mina, has been influenced by Akiyama.
For readers interested in Japanese photography, photobooks, documentary photography, childhood, and the relationship between memory and time, Dear Old Days III offers a gentle and deeply personal look at how photographs can preserve not only people, but the worlds they grew up in.
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Language: Chinese & Japanese
Format: Hardcover | 144 pages
Dimensions: 260 x 250mm | 795g
Publication Year: 2025 | Third Edition
ISBN: 978-4-909787-03-3
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