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Paper short abstract

Framed by Mbembe’s necropolitics, this paper traces the shift of atomic photography from Domon Ken and Tōmatsu Shōmei to the 1972 photobook Hiroshima, Hiroshima, hírou-ʃímə. I argue this lineage transforms the medium from political evidence into a counter-narrative that actively reimagines trauma.

Paper long abstract

As 2025 marks the eightieth anniversary of the Asia-Pacific War, this paper examines the trajectory of nuclear memory through the lens of Achille Mbembe’s necropolitics. Drawing on this framework, I position the bombings not merely as military acts, but as the ultimate exercise of sovereign power that reduced the population to bare existence. This forced hibakusha (survivors) into a “death-world”—a liminal existence where the body survives biologically yet remains socially inscribed for a slow death. This research asks: How have photographic practices evolved from documenting these scars to deconstructing the visual language of trauma itself? Rather than viewing these images merely as historical evidence, I trace a critical shift that moves from politicized documentation toward radical self-reflexivity.

The analysis begins with Domon Ken’s Hiroshima (1958), examining how the Realist movement deployed the scarred body to indict state negligence, yet paradoxically constructed a homogenized victimhood that rendered the survivors into a unified national symbol. I then turn to Tōmatsu Shōmei’s 11:02 Nagasaki (1966), which introduced a subjective gaze that complicates how viewers encounter atomic trauma, shifting from the classification of wounded flesh to the haunting persistence of objects and memory.

The progression culminates in the collective photobook Hiroshima, Hiroshima, hírou-ʃímə (1972), produced by the All-Japan Students Photo Association (Zen-Nichi). Emerging from the radicalized student movement of the late 1960s—a generation shaped by the 1960 Anpo protests and disillusioned with both state authority and established left-wing institutions—these photographers rejected the visual conventions of their predecessors. By rejecting both standard Kanji (city) and Katakana (symbol) in favor of a phonetic “third Hiroshima,” they staged a generational rupture. I argue that this mirrors the physical reality of the bomb: just as the explosion reduced the body to debris, this title strips the word “Hiroshima” of its history, reducing a heavy cultural symbol to a raw sound.

Ultimately, this lineage reveals how photography functions as a counter-narrative to state power. By reclaiming the reality of the atomic experience from political instrumentalization, these works demonstrate how photography can disrupt the silence of the death-world, transforming the victimhood into an active, defiant visuality.