Restricted Residence
- Author: Giles Price
- Sewn booklet with embossed buckram cover, 80 pages, 42 photos printed with a custom experimental 5 colour profile
- 197mm x 300mm (Portrait)
- Published & designed by Loose Joints, January 2020, LJ130
- Language: Essay by Fred Pearce in English & Japanese
- ISBN: 978-1-912719-13-6
- Price: £25 plus shipping
- Available to buy HERE
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.
Reviews –
‘Radiation is perhaps the most iconic of the invisible pollutants. For those of us who can see, vision is one of our most prominent senses. We depend on it so much that when something is not visible, we consider it non-existent. Giles Price addresses this potently in his “Restricted Residence” series. He reminds us that radiation is real. It can be seen. Price’s photographs call upon us to treat it as real.’ – Aileen Mioko Smith, Director of Green Action and co-author with W. Eugene Smith of ‘Minamata: A warning to the world’
‘His series is people-filled, but this is also a portrait of absence, invisibility and uncertainty. For, hidden deep within the images, Price captures something far more insidious – the questioning of what might be taking place, undetectable, within one’s own body. What hidden stresses – physical and psychological – are these people under? Can they ever truly understand the land they have decided to return to?’ – Tom Seymour for Wallpaper*
‘The use of the thermal camera is employed in sensible metaphor and offers a way in which to describe the unseen calamity harbouring at the edges of the atmosphere within. To call Price’s book clever would be a disservice to himself and those involved.’ – Brad Feuerhelm for ASX
‘The normalcy of the photos is misleading, forcing viewers to look for something that isn’t present. Price invites visitors, in a brilliant fashion, to experience the unseen weight of the psychological burden while attempting to grasp the impact of radiation.’ – Lily Katzman for Smithsonian Magazine
‘Price’s book encourages viewers to rethink their own perception about environments affected by tragedy.’ – Marigold Warner for British Journal of Photography
