Photographer and Visual Artist
Takashi Arai became interested in photography during his biology studies in Tokyo. While exploring the origins of photographs, he encountered and eventually mastered the daguerreotype, using this early technique to create “micro-monuments” – image-objects that vividly convey the sensation of engaging with events and subjects beyond time and space.
In 2010, Arai encountered the hull of the Daigo Fukuryū Maru – The Lucky Dragon V – a fishing boat damaged by an American nuclear test in 1954, and its former crew. He has continued to cover nuclear topics since then at locations including Fukushima, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In addition to his photography, he is a filmmaker, writer and researcher.
Arai’s work has been exhibited widely in Japan and internationally, including at the Yokohama Museum of Art, the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and Purdy Hicks Gallery in London. His awards include the 2014 Source-Cord Prize, the 41st Kimura Ihei Photography Award in 2016, and the short film category at the Salerno Film Festival in 2018. His series “Exposed in a Hundred Suns” was shortlisted for the Prix Pictet under the ‘Storm’ theme in 2025.
His work is in the collections of the Smithsonian, MFA Boston, SFMOMA, MOMAT, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography and Musée Guimet, Paris.
