This module begins in January1941 when a photograph was taken. 



In this image we are introduced to Yajima Isao and his new bride, Eiko sitting in the grounds of the grand Atami Ocean Hotel (Atami Taiyo Hoteru). In the image, the newlyweds sit, Eiko was, or was soon to be, pregnant with their first child, and there is no evidence here of a nation at war. In the background of the image, a father plays with his child, and laundry – bathers perhaps - dries in the bushes. Isao almost certainly took this picture himself. Having chosen a suitable spot, with favourable lighting and the backdrop of the hotel’s grand entrance, he probably mounted the camera on its tripod, set the timer, and then ran back to his seat. In their family life, Eiko would soon give birth to their first child, Haruki. In their visual life, Isao would assume the new role of father-photographer (otosan kameraman) and make a shift in physical and emotional geography to a place behind the camera.

This image is the foundation stone for the this module. It gives us a date, a place and a face and it begins our story. Before you read about how this module works, you might find it useful to read more about Yajima Isao himself.

How this module works
This module is based on three consecutive family albums, which will be called Album 1, 2 and 3. As historical sources they are made for touching and gazing, suspended between what Kathleen Canning describes as “narrativity and materiality” (Canning DATE). The albums themselves are made of cardboard, velvet, and cardstock – they are heavy to hold, and smell of dust and damp. They are well-kept, but bear traces of their maker: handwriting, nicknames, even the whirling sepia fingerprints on pressed-down corners. 

There are four pathways. The first introduces the wider historical context on how photography was not only cultivated as an "ideal family pastime" (Ross, DATE) but how its practice became gendered through the spaces in which taking photos happened. The remaining three pathways take each album in turn. Album 1:  follows Isao's transition from dental student and newlywed, to father and tracks his movement behind the camera and questions the prevailing postwar narrative surrounding the absent father by showing the archival challenges in accounting for presence. Album 2 is mostly holiday photos and while perhaps expected album fodder it also traces the disappearance of images of Isao's teenage children - practically how the family's ability to travel changes as the children grow... Album 3 is an ode to and archive of Isao's extensive car collection, it explores the 

Family, travel and his cars emerge as ...