is a photojournalist best known for his depiction of the effects of mercury poisoning on people in and near Minamata over a period of some forty years.
Kuwabara was born — as Fumiaki Kuwabara (, Kuwabara Fumiaki) — in the village of Kibe (now part of Tsuwano), Shimane Prefecture, Japan.Birthday: Works by 25 Photographers in their 20s (catalogue of an exhibition held at Kiyosato Museum of Photographic Arts in 1995), p. 89. Place of birth and original name: CV . Much other information below comes from one or other of these sources. In 1960 he graduated from the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Tokyo Photo School (later Tokyo College of Photography).
In the same year Kuwabara started work as a freelance photographer. With a letter of introduction from a journalist with Shūkan Asahi magazine, he visited the director of Minamata Municipal Hospital, Dr Noboru Ōhashi, in July, to ask for permission to photograph. Ōhashi gave him permission for long-term coverage.Start at Minamata: Works by 25 Photographers, pp. 82–3. This catalogue also presents examples of his early work in Minamata, and a potted CV.
Kuwabara's photographs of Minamata were shown in his first solo exhibition, Minamata-byō (Minamata disease), at the Fuji Photo Salon in Tokyo in September 1962. This won the newcomers' award of the Japan Photo Critics Association.JPCA award: 25 Photographers, p. 89.
Kuwabara's works have also won an award from Kodansha in 1965, the Photographic Society of Japan's Annual Award in 1971, and the Ina Nobuo Award in 1982.Kōdansha award: (list of award winners). PSJ award: 日本写真協会 過去の受賞者一覧 (PSJ, list of past award-winners). Ina Nobuo Award: (announcement of the 7th Ina Nobuo Award to Shinzō Hanabusa and Kuwabara).
Since 1997, Tsuwano has had a gallery largely devoted to Kuwabara's work. Until March 2004, this was called the Tsuwano Documentary Photograph Gallery; it was then renamed the Shisei Kuwabara Photographics Museum.
Notes
Books by Kuwabara
Shashin-shū Minamata-byō () / Minamata Desease [sic]. Tokyo: San'ichi Shobō, 1965. Shashin-kiroku Minamata-byō 1960–1970 ( 1960–1970, "Documentary: Minamata disease"). Tokyo: Asahi Shinbun, 1970. Seikatsusha gunzō (, "Collage of living people"). Tokyo: San'ichi Shobō, 1980. Minamata Kankoku Betonamu (). Tokyo: Banseisha, 1982. Tōji no sato Kōrai, Richō (). Tokyo: Iwanami, 1984. Kōrai, Richō gendai tōjisen (). Tokyo: Mainichi Shinbun, 1985. Kankoku genkei (, "Korea's original scenes"). Tokyo: San'ichi Shobō, 1986. Minamata (, "Minamata"). Komichi Shobō, 1986. Hōdōshashinka (, "Documentary photographer"). Tokyo: Iwanami, 1989. Kankoku shinjō toro (, "Expressing genuine sentiments about Korea"). Tokyo: Ōtsuki, 1990. Yameru taikoku Roshia (, "Russia, a sick great nation"). Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1995. Kuwabara Shisei / Minamata (). Tokyo: Nihon Tosho Sentā, 1996. Black and white photographs, in one volume (sold separately) of a multivolume set about pollution in Japan. In Japanese only. Kuwabara Shisei shashin zenshū (, The Complete Works of Kuwabara, Shinsei.) Tokyo: Kusa-no-Ne. Each of these four volumes contains explanatory text in English as well as Japanese. 1. Minamata (, Minamata). 2004. 2. Kankoku (, South Korea). 1998. 3. Chikuhō/Okinawa (, Chikuho/Okinawa). 2004. The first half is about the declining coalmines of Chikuho. 4. Betonamu (, Vietnam). 1999. Imujin-gan: Kaima-mita Kita Chōsen (, "Imjin-gang: Glimpses of North Korea"). Tokyo: Kusa-no-Ne, 2003. Black and white photographs of North Korea. In Japanese only.
Other books with works by Kuwabara
Nihon shashin no tenkan: 1960 nendai no hyōgen () / Innovation in Japanese Photography in the 1960s. Tokyo: Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, 1991. Exhibition catalogue, text in Japanese and English. Pp. 104–113 are devoted to Kuwabara's photographs of Minamata.
External links Official Website (Adobe Flash Player required) Minamata exhibition notice: contains some photographs : an article about an exhibition in Seoul of Kuwabara's photographs of South Korea Shisei Kuwabara Photographics Museum Short CV