Whether it's the work of Robert Capa in the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) or Richard Drew's iconic "Falling Man" picture of a man free-falling from the World Trade Center in 2001, photography has provided us with the images that we've used to visualize every disaster of the 20th century and beyond. But the art form doesn't simply record disaster, it documents what comes after.
Four Japanese photographers — Takashi Arai, Toshiya Murakoshi, Keiko Sasaoka and Aya Fujioka — have independently been using the medium to document different aspects of two nuclear events Japan has experienced over the past century: the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II, and the meltdowns at Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 2011.
Using vastly different techniques and styles, these photographers have attempted to record how Japan confronts such social issues, looking at a wide variety of subjects in the process.