Yumi Goto wanted children in areas hit hard by the March 11 disaster to record the devastation and reconstruction from their own perspectives, because they are the future.
Yumi Goto wanted children in areas hit hard by the March 11 disaster to record the devastation and reconstruction from their own perspectives, because they are the future.
“Children can convey (the damage and rebuilding) with photos if they cannot draw paintings or complement with words,” Goto, a 45-year-old photo consultant, said.
A collection of about 150 photos taken by 33 elementary and junior high school students in Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures will be published on Feb. 23.
Rui Ogawa, a third-grader in Otsuchi, Iwate Prefecture, photographed rusted railway tracks of the JR Yamada Line in the prefecture. Part of its service, between Miyako and Kamaishi, has been suspended since the disaster.
“The tracks were disconnected by the tsunami. They got rusted because the trains did not run,” Rui wrote in the caption.
Reina Tamada, a fifth-grader in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, focused on school satchels damaged by the tsunami.
Kota Hasegawa, a fifth-grader in Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, photographed his garden to show it to his friend, who moved to Hiroshima after the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
“Radiation levels were as high as 3.32 microsieverts. We are going to evacuate because radiation levels were 1.12 microsieverts even after the soil was scraped,” Kota wrote in the caption.
Goto sought children who wanted to participate in the project after the Great East Japan Earthquake, and the children began taking photos in June, with guidance from professional photographers.
Other photographs feature smiling faces of evacuees in temporary housing and the reconstruction of a family’s sushi restaurant.
“The photo collection is full of children’s enthusiasm to convey something somehow,” Goto said of “3/11 Kids Photo Journal,” published by Kodansha Ltd. “I hope readers will imagine what the children think while turning the pages.”
Photos in the 120-page collection are on display at the Sony Building in Tokyo’s Ginza district through Feb. 29.