Osam Hiraki, independent photography critic and photographic historian, is director of the Photographic Society of Japan. cofounder of the department of photography at the Kawasaki City Museum where he edited and wrote catalogs and articles about the 1950s, he co-edited the Japanese Photography Guide (Nazraeli Press, 1996). In 1998, he curated the world's first "Pulitzer Prize Photography Exhibition."

Alain Sayag, head curator of photography at the National Museum of Art in Paris, has directed several international exhibitions and has published numerous photography books.

Keiichi Takeuchi, professor emeritus at Hitotsubashi University in Japan and former director of the Japanese Cultural Institute in Rome, is an authority on the history of geographical thought.

Introduction / Alain Sayag -- 1945-1964: a Japanese perspective / Takeuchi Keiichi -- Deciphering Japanese postwar photography / Hiraki Osam -- Plates: The aftermath of war -- Between tradition and modernity -- A new Japan.