The Restoration Will (ONLY 87 COPIES)

Mayumi Suzuki
The Restoration Will (ONLY 87 COPIES)

Photographs: Mayumi Suzuki

Text: Mayumi Suzuki

Publisher: Self/ Reminders Project

104 pages

Pictures: 62

Year: 2017

Comments: Hardcover, 285 x 190 mm. First edition, 2017. Design by Yumi Goto and Jan Rosseel. B&w and color photographs printed on washi. Handmade edition limited to 87 signed copies. As new.

My parents, who owned a photo studio, went missing after the 2011 tsunami. Our house was destroyed. It was a place for working, but also for living. I grew up there. After the disaster, I found my father’s lens, portfolio, and our family album buried in the mud and the rubble.

One day, I tried to take a landscape photo with my father’s muddy lens. The image came out dark and blurry, like a view of the deceased. Through taking it, I felt I could connect this world with that world. I felt like I could have a conversation with my parents, though in fact that is impossible.

The family snapshots I found were washed white, the images disappearing. The portraits taken by my father were stained, discolored. These scars are similar to the damage seen in my town, similar to my memories which I am slowly losing.

I hope to retain my memory and my family history through this book. By arranging these photos, I have attempted to reproduce it.

- Mayumi Suzuki

Photographs, text, printing and book binding by Mayumi Suzuki
Blue portfolio and photo archives by Atsushi Sasaki

Concept, edit and art-direction developed in the 2016 Photobook as Object workshop by Yumi Goto and Jan Rosseel in collaboration with Reminders Photography Stronghold. The edition number of this photobook, 87, represents the number of years since the family-owned photo studio was first opened in 1930.