was a Japanese photographer.

Career

Kurata was born in Chūō-ku,

Tokyo Tokyo, officially the Tokyo Metropolis, is the capital of Japan, capital and List of cities in Japan, most populous city in Japan. With a population of over 14 million in the city proper in 2023, it is List of largest cities, one of the most ...

, 1945. He graduated from the

Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music or is a school of art and music in Japan. Located in Ueno Park, it also has facilities in Toride, Ibaraki, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Kitasenju and Adachi, Tokyo. The university has trained artists in the fields of painting, sculpture, crafts, inter ...

in 1968. He taught in secondary school and worked in oils, printmaking, and experimental movies. He practised under Daidō Moriyama in an independent photography workshop in 1976. Kurata won the fifth Kimura Ihei Award in 1980 for his first book, ''Flash Up.'' For the

black-and-white Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white to produce a range of achromatic brightnesses of grey. It is also known as greyscale in technical settings. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, ...

photographs here, Kurata used flash and a

medium format Medium format has traditionally referred to a film format in photography and the related cameras and equipment that use film. Nowadays, the term applies to film and digital cameras that record images on media larger than the used in 35&n ...

camera, resulting in a detailed portrait of a world of ''

bōsōzoku is a Japanese youth subculture associated with customized motorcycles. The first appearance of these types of biker gangs was in the 1950s. Popularity peaked at an estimated 42,510 members in 1982. Their numbers dropped dramatically in the 200 ...

,'' gangsters, rightists, strippers, transvestites, and so on: as Parr and

Badger Badgers are medium-sized short-legged omnivores in the superfamily Musteloidea. Badgers are a polyphyletic rather than a natural taxonomic grouping, being united by their squat bodies and adaptions for fossorial activity rather than by the ...

point out, these are old subjects; but in his "highly polished, detailed" work, Kurata "has an unerring instinct for pictures that suggest stories". ''Photo Cabaret'' and ''80's Family'' continued in this direction. This Japanese work of Kurata's is anthologized in his later volume ''Japan.'' Kurata won the PSJ award in 1992. A long stay in

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

in 1994 led to the book ''Toransu Ajia,'' which continued color work of the Asian mainland started with ''Dai-Ajia.'' In 1999 Kurata's book ''Japan'' won the Kodansha Publishing Culture Award () for a work of photography. Prints of Kurata's photographs are in the permanent collections of ICP (New York), the

Brooklyn Museum The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough (New York City), borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Located near the Prospect Heig ...

, and the

Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography The is an art museum concentrating on photography. As the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, it was founded by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, and is in Meguro-ku, a short walk from Ebisu station in southwest Tokyo. The museum also ...

. He died on 27 February 2020.

Solo exhibitions

* "Street Photo Random Tokyo 1975–79".

Nikon Salon is the name given to exhibition spaces and activities run by Nikon in Japan. The Ginza Nikon Salon (in Ginza, Tokyo) opened in January 1968 (with an exhibition of work by Ihei Kimura) to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Nippon Kōgaku (later re ...

, Tokyo and Osaka, 1979.List of exhibitions, last (non-numbered) page, "Trans Asia, again!" (Tokyo: Place M, 2013). * "Photo Cabaret". Doi Photo Plaza, Shibuya, Tokyo, 1983. * "Street Photo Random Tokyo 2". Nikon Salon, Tokyo, 1986. * "Great Asia". Minolta Photo Space, Shinjuku, Tokyo, 1990. *"Quest for Eros" I. Mole, Tokyo, 1993. * "Trans Asia". Nikon Salon, Tokyo; Visual Arts School, Osaka, 1995. *"Tokyo: Theatrical Megalopolis". O. K. Harris Gallery, New York, 1995. * "Trans Market: Tokyo Kanda vegetable and fruit market". Nikon Salon, Tokyo and Osaka, 1996. * Japan from the 70s to the 90s. Kodak Photo Salon, Tokyo, 1999. *"Quest for Eros" II. Galleria Prova, Tokyo, 1999. *. Epsite, Tokyo, 2008. *. Gallery Punctum, Tokyo, 2009. *"Trans Asia, again!" Place M, Tokyo, 2013.

Publications by Kurata

Following a title in Japanese script, an italicized roman-letter title is one provided on or in the book itself; a non-italicized roman-letter title is a mere gloss of the original title. *''Flash Up: Street Photo Random Tokyo 1975–1979.'' Tokyo: Byakuya Shobō, 1980. Black-and-white photographs. Includes one essay in English but also several in Japanese only; the captions too are only in Japanese. *''Foto Kyabarē'' () / ''Photo Cabaret.'' Tokyo: Byakuya Shobō, 1982. . Black-and-white photographs of Japan. Text in Japanese only. *''Dai-Ajia'' (, Great Asia). Tokyo: IBC, 1990. . *''80's Family: Street Photo Random Japan.'' Tokyo: JICC Shuppankyoku, 1991. . Black-and-white and colour photographs of Japan. Text in Japanese only. *''Toransu-Ajia'' (, Trans-Asia). Tokyo:

Ōta Shuppan is a Japanese publishing company. With a number of controversial books that disturbed the Japanese society and its erotic manga comics, the company has established itself like a source of provocative "subculture" items. History Ohta Publishing ...

, 1995. . *''Japan'' () / ''Japan.'' Tokyo: Shinchōsha, Photo Musée, 1998. . The captions are in English. *''Kuesuto fō Erosu'' () / ''Quest for Eros.'' Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1998. . *''Trans Asia, again!'' Tokyo: Place M, 2013. . Zine, published on the occasion of an exhibition at Place M of the same title. *''Flash Up.'' Tokyo: Zen Foto Gallery, 2013. *''Toshi no zōkei'' (). Kamakura: Super Labo, 2015. .Super Labo's page about the booklet i
here

Notes

References

Links and sources

* Iizawa Kōtarō. ''Tōkyō shashin'' () / ''Tokyo Photography.'' Tokyo: Inax, 1995. . Despite the English subtitle, all in Japanese. Photographs by and essays on Kineo Kuwabara, William Klein,

Masatoshi Naitō is a Japanese photographer. According to Michael Hoppen Gallery, Naitō was born in Tokyo in 1938. He graduated from Waseda University in applied sciences and trained as a research scientist. A keen interest in the folkloric traditions of Japan l ...

, Shigeo Gochō,

Nobuyoshi Araki , professionally known by the mononym , is a Japanese photographer and contemporary artist. Known primarily for photography that blends eroticism and bondage in a fine art context, he has published over 500 books. Early life and education Araki ...

, Daidō Moriyama, Ryūji Miyamoto, Kyōichi Tsuzuki, and Yurie Nagashima, as well as Kurata.
Profile
at TPO Photo School.

*Ono, Philbert.
Kurata Seiji
. Brief note at PhotoGuide Japan. *Parr, Martin, and Gerry Badger. ''The Photobook'' 1. London: Phaidon, 2004. . * ''Sanjūroku fotogurafāzu: Kimura Ihei Shashinshō no sanjūnen'' (, 36 photographers: 30 years of the Kimura Ihei Award). Tokyo: Asahi Shinbun, 2005. . With sample photographs from each of the award-winners. * ''Shashinshū o yomu: Besuto 338 kanzen gaido'' (, Reading photobooks: A complete guide to the best 338). Tokyo: Metarōgu, 1997. . P.172. Review of ''80's Family.'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Kurata, Seiji 1945 births 2020 deaths People from Chūō, Tokyo Tokyo University of the Arts alumni Japanese street photographers