windows

windows is a photobook by Yoshiyuki Okuyama made from frosted and patterned glass windows he photographed across Tokyo between April 2020 and November 2022. From about 100,000 frames, the first he ever shot on a digital camera, the book collects 724. Published by Akaaka Art Publishing in 2023.

The story behind the book

During the pandemic, with little chance to travel abroad, Okuyama walked the streets of Tokyo and began to notice the windows that face the road. Behind the clouded glass, everyday things show through: kitchen taps, figurines, flowers, laundry, notices, umbrellas, household shrines, bicycles. Cropped by the window frame, each interior turns into an abstract pattern that also holds shadows and reflections from outside, and makes you imagine whoever lives there. Each window becomes a portrait of someone in Tokyo.

In his previous book, flowers (2021), Okuyama looked out through a window toward one person, his late grandmother. In windows he looks in from outside, toward strangers. It is the second book in a trilogy that portrays people through subjects other than people.

What is in the book

• 724 photographs selected from about 100,000 frames
• 752 pages in an ochre cloth binding that recalls the natural materials of a house
• Followed by photographs (2026), which completes the trilogy

About Yoshiyuki Okuyama

Born in 1991 in Tokyo, Okuyama received an Excellence Award at the 34th Canon New Cosmos of Photography and the 47th Kodansha Publishing Culture Award for photography. His photobooks include flowers and As the Call, So the Echo (both Akaaka).