Zacqery Petras

Mr. Sandoval
Photography, B1
24 October 2014
Daid! Moriyama
Daid! Moriyama is one of the most revered photographers in Japan. He was born in
Ikeda City, Osaka, Japan. He was born with a twin brother in 1938, but his brother died at the
age of two. Currently living today, Moriyama is famous for his work in photography, graphic
design, and writing. He studied photography at the school of Takeji Iwamiya in Osaka. He
moved to Tokyo in 1961 to meet the members of an organization called VIVO. Here he became
the assistant to a man named Eikoh Hosoe. With this he gained access to the photo world if
Tokyo. Moriyamas work consisted of saturated, black and white photos with contrast. The
photographs epitomize wabi-sabi. This is the Japanese style of finding beauty in imperfection.
Moriyama focuses in on the lost and the discarded, and finds echoes of living through the
breakdown of traditional values in post-war Japan. Moriyama also focused on the indigenous
world or the few indigenous things that had not been corrupted by the rapidly industrializing
world. He doesnt have a fixed mind set. He searches for beauty in anything. Moriyamas work
art pieces vary in price. Cheapest piece staring at $3,000, can range up to $7,500. Moriyamas
photography shows the poverty of post-war Japan. Though dark pictures, he seems to find the
beauty side of it. Daid! Moriyama is an icon to the Japanese people.
Petras 1
http://www.stevenkasher.com/artist/daido_moriyama/biography/
http://www.artnet.com/artists/daido-moriyama/biography
http://www.artspace.com/daido_moriyama
Petras 2