Restricted Residence

Author : GILES PRICE

80 Pages, 197mm x 300mm, Portrait

42 photos printed with a custom experimental 5 – colour profile

Sewn booklet with embossed buckram cover

Essay by Fred Pearce in English & Japanese

Published & designed by Loose Joints, January 2020, LJ130

ISBN: 978-1-912719-13-6

£25 plus postage

Available to purchase here

DESCRIPTION

Restricted Residence by Giles Price examines the relocation of Japanese citizens to Namie and Iitate, two towns exposed to extreme radioactivity following the catastrophic leak at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

Despite the inconclusive scientific consensus of the long-term effects of radiation in the area, in 2017 the Japanese government began to reduce the exclusion zones and heavily financially incentivise residents to return to what were formerly bustling towns, with nearly 20,000 living and working there. Now, the area is eerily empty, with just a few hundred people brave enough to return. With the reactor still unrepaired and uninhabitable radiation hotspots scattered across the landscape, some believe these areas will not be safe for 50 years or longer.

Restricted Residence employs thermal technology often used in medicine and industrial surveying, to render the everyday landscapes of Namie and Iitate surreal and inverted. With an accompanying essay by environmental writer Fred Pearce, Restricted Residence attempts to illustrate the hidden stresses on those affected by the nuclear disaster, while raising questions about the broader impact of manmade catastrophes upon our fragile environment.