One of the leading representatives of post-war photography in Japan, Yasuhiro Ishimoto passed away Feb 6 at a hospital in Tokyo. He was 90-years-old. Born in San Francisco in 1921, Ishimoto lived in Japan from the age of three before returning to the US in 1939, where he began a course in architecture at Northwestern University in Chicago. It was during World War II, while he was held at the Amache Internment Camp for Japanese-Americans, that he began to study photography. Following the end of the war, he continued his study at the Illinois Institute of Technology, then known as Chicago Institute of Design, where he was twice recognized with the photography department’s Moholy-Nagy Prize. In 1953 he returned to Japan, where he began one of his best-known projects, photographing the Katsura Imperial Villa in Kyoto, on commission from the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He later collaborated with the architect Kenzo Tange on the publication Katsura: Tradition and Creation in Japanese Architecture, published in 1960. In 1955 he was included in Edward Steichen’s “Family of Man” exhibition at MoMA, and he participated widely in other exhibitions. He won numerous awards and distinctions for his photos and photobooks. In 1957 he was recognized with the photographer of the year award by the Japan Photo Critics Association, and in 1969 his photobook Chicago, Chicago earned the Mainichi Arts Prize. In 1996 the Japanese government named him a Person of Cultural Merit, and in 2005 he was granted the Purple Ribbon Medal of Honor for academic and artistic achievement.
