Kyoichi Tsuzuki
Kyoichi Tsuzuki
Museums of Erotica
Softcover
150 × 107 × 50 mm
448 pages
Colour Illustrations
2023
English, Japanese
Seigensha
About the Book:
Kyoichi Tsuzuki explores a fascinating—and largely forgotten—Japanese cultural heritage: wander through Japan’s hallowed halls of pleasure in this 400-plus-page photographic archive of sex museums.
Published in conjunction with Love Hotels
Japan’s museums of erotica began springing up in tourist towns across the country in the 1970s amid an unprecedented domestic travel boom. Seen through the eye of editor and photographer Kyoichi Tsuzuki, the eclectic kitsch of the exhibits at these adult amusement centers is as novel today as it was decades ago; at the same time, the spaces teem with the nostalgia of a bygone era, exuding an almost artistic ambience. The collection also features text and photographs documenting what has become of some of these museums in the present day.
Kyoichi Tsuzuki was born in Tokyo in 1956. From 1976 to 1986, he was a freelance editor for the influential men’s fashion and lifestyle magazines Popeye and Brutus, where he wrote on contemporary art, design, urban living, and related topics. From 1989 to 1992, he published Art Random (Kyoto Shoin), a 102-volume series covering 1980s trends in global contemporary art. He continues to write and edit works on contemporary art, architecture, photography, design, and more. In 1993, he released the photobook Tokyo Style (Kyoto Shoin), which depicts the living spaces of Tokyoites in a raw, unfiltered context; in 1997, he received the Kimura Ihei Award for his photobook Roadside Japan (Aspect, 1997), which marked the start of a still-ongoing project to document roadside subjects both in Japan and abroad.
Book review by Branden Zavaleta |
Photo books tend to be as tall and as wide as a painting– with behemoths like Taschen’s Baby Sumo taking this idea of bigger is better to its illogical conclusion– but sometimes the impact and detail of a big book isn’t what best suits the collection. Kyoichi Tsuzuki’s Museums of Erotica makes a great example of this by sharing the secrets of Japan’s little known Hihokans in a book the size of a postcard. Compact and easily concealed, cracking it open makes you feel like you’ve found one of these back alleys, or quiet sidestreets in Japan’s non-tourist districts.
The first few pages promise titillation, and sights never-before-seen, then you’re faced with the facades of these museums, their gaudy signs, and an empty ticket booth. Seigensha organised the book in such a way that Tsuzuki’s two-decade long project (1990s-2010s) is now a high-powered trip through the subculture’s strangest and best. And whether you read English or Japanese, it’s best experienced by reading right-to-left (though the english introduction is certainly worth reading for the life and charming colour it adds to the places).
Reading it this way, a perfect image appears after you’ve been shocked and stunned by all the phallus-headed monks, stained-glass erotica, and samurai sex. It’s of a flailing mannequin being put in the back of a moving van– she doesn’t want to be part of history just yet, just give her a few more days in the spotlight. It’s like seeing through a door left open to the loading docks while walking back to the entrance. It puts a bow on our tour through these unexpected exhibits– pulling the curtain back and releasing us back into the real world– while also being emblematic of the slow fall of the subculture and Tsuzuki’s documentary mission.
And it can’t be overstated how well Tsuzki’s work serves this book as a historical document. His compositions are always natural, yet composed so that we can take in the sight as intended and without distraction. He leans in where we would lean in, but knows when to back off, and he even captures the sections between exhibits– the hallways and staircases that give us time to digest what we’ve seen. For a subject that aims to excite and surprise, Tsuzuki manages to keep his subjective experience to himself (with a few exceptions), and uses considered but plain compositions to allow the reader to experience the works subjectively instead. So though many of these museums and displays will never be open again, you can wander these halls and experience them as you, personally, would. The book is its own museum of erotica.
