Ravens & Red Lipstick

An accessible and visually rich study of Japanese photography since 1945 by an experienced curator specializing in Japanese art and culture. From the severity of post-war Realism to the diversity and technical ingenuity of the present, via movements and groups such as Vivo in the 1960s and ‘girls’ photography’ in the 1990s, this visually bold and richly volume traces the development of Japanese photography since 1945. Interleaved are new interviews with some of the most influential practitioners in photographic history, from Moriyama Daido to Araki Nobuyoshi and Kawauchi Rinko. Lena Fritsch writes with imagination and clarity, interrogating a cross-section of photographic movements and works against the vivid, shifting backdrop of Japanese social, cultural and political history. The result is both an accessible introduction and an illuminating work of analysis for general readers and aficionados alike.

'Lena Fritsch's vivid commentary and nuanced scholarship contextualise the influential characters, important works and entangled political movements of a fascinating history' - Aesthetica, 'An expansive, informative book' - Tatler, 'A rich, visually alluring survey of Japanese photography from the post-war period to the present day ' - The i Newspaper, 'Vast and luscious ' - AnOther

Lena Fritsch is a specialist in 20th- and 21st-century Japanese art and photography, and an experienced translator of the Japanese language. As Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Ashmolean Museum (University of Oxford), she works on exhibitions and displays of international art. Before joining the Ashmolean, she was Assistant Curator of International Art at Tate Modern, where she worked on acquisitions and displays of art from the Asia-Pacific region. Her publications include Yasumasa Morimura’s ‘Self-Portrait as Actress’ (2008), The Body as a Screen: Japanese Art Photography of the 1990s (2011), an English-language edition of Moriyama Daido’s Tales of Tono (2012) and Tokyo: Art & Photography (2021). She holds a PhD in Art History from Bonn University, Germany and also studied at Keio University, Tokyo. Fritsch lectures in Japanese photography at the University of Oxford, V&A and SOAS.