Studio Equis

(b. Tokuyama, Yamaguchi, 1918-1990)

Selected Works

A selection of images by this artist can be viewed here

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Tadahiko Hayashi

Hayashi was born into a family of commercial photographers, but instead of taking over the family business he went on to establish himself as a leading documentary photographer. After graduating from Tokuyama Business School in 1935 he became an apprentice at the Nakayama Shoichi Photo Studio in Osaka. He subsequently contracted tuberculosis and returned home to be hospitalized; while home, he began taking photographs intensively. Hayashi then studied at the Oriental School of Photography in Tokyo in 1939 and became involved with a wide variety of photographic associations. During the Pacific War he worked as a reporter in China, returning to Tokyo in 1946.

The central focus of Hayashi’s photographic works was always people. He is perhaps best known for his photographs of Tokyo, in series such as Kasutori Jidai (Days in the Dregs) shot between 1946 and 1955. This series documenting Tokyo in the aftermath of war, showed the strength for survival and determination of the Japanese people. Hayashi was also an excellent portrait photographer and his portraits of artists and writers became very popular in Japan. Hayashi maintained his involvement with photographic organizations throughout his life, becoming vice-president of the Japanese Professional Photographers Society (JPS) in 1961 and headmaster of the Japan School of Photography from 1980–89.  Tokuyama city established the Hayashi Tadahiko Award in 1992, two years after his death. In 1993 a retrospective of his work was shown at the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography.