In the aftermath of World War II, Japan was a wounded nation. The havoc wreaked by the war still prohibited any kind of travel across the country. While reading school books and magazines, young Moriyama came across the names of the cities of Hokkaido, the archipelago’s large northern island. These names echoed in his mind as exotic a destination as New York, Paris or Rome could be.

Daido Moriyama began travelling to Hokkaido at the beginning of the 1960s. He took pictures of the region quite compulsively, particularly throughout the year 1978. He then returned to the island on several occasions. On his latest trips (2008-2010) he brought back colour photographs.

Daido Moriyama’s work is based on a true conception of travelling and straying, which he describes in the first part of his autobiography Memories of a Dog (1984) has taking photos to retrace his own steps, confronting his muddled memories, gathering additionnal ones and brooding on like a drifter always taking the same paths.