First edition of Shadows of Dreams: The Photographs of Teiko Shiotani 1899－1988 by Teiko Shiotani (2019)

First impression

Medium format softcover with dust jacket in fine condition

Some very minor wear to extremities of the cover and minor markings on the back of the dust jacket (as seen on photo)

Pages clean, binding firm

240 pages, 136 images

About

“An almost god-like figure”
— Shoji Ueda about Teiko Shiotani

“Shadows of Dreams” is the definitive book on Teiko Shiotani’s photography.

Teiko Shiotani, born in Tottori Prefecture in 1899, was one of the most influential pioneers of Japanese photography. His refined compositions have come to define the fine-art photography movement of the 1920s and 1930s, and through his publications in photography magazines, Shiotani’s art has influenced the young photographers of his era.

Gifted in skill and interested in experimentation, Shiotani used a small Vest Pocket Kodak camera whose lens hood he removed for even softer images, pioneered techniques of bending the photographic paper during the printing process to create strange-looking landscapes or manipulated images in other imaginative ways. Almost a hundred years later, the high quality and dignified beauty of his work have lost none of their appeal.

“Shadows of Dreams” offers a look at Shiotani’s full oeuvre in four chapters as well as texts by his grand-daughter Susumu Shiotani and publisher Noriko Tsutatani, photographs about Shiotani’s life, a chronological record, a bibliography, and a catalogue listing Shiotani’s works.