OYAKO (Japanese parents & children)
Featuring: Bruce Osborn
OYAKO, the Japanese word for parent and child, is the title of a series I have been working on since 1982.
It began with a magazine assignment to photograph punk musicians when I hit on the idea of photographing them with their parents. Thinking it would be an amusing way to bring out the differences in lifestyles and fashions between the two generations, what came back was infinitely more.
The pictures revealed so much about family relations; I decided to continue exploring this theme as a way of looking at Japanese society and the changes from one generation to the next.
The bond between a parent and child has an enormous impact everyone, no matter where we are from. The parents are the first people that a newborn baby meets and the base for all future relations. As the child grows, so do the roots that connect them to family, friends, and communities.
OYAKO is a link in of a long unbroken chain that goes back to the beginning of life itself.
ARTIST BIO
Bruce Osborn was born in Southern California and raised on its surf and skateboard culture. He began his photographic career working for the music industry in Los Angeles before moving to Japan in 1980.
Bruce’s clientele and recognition have grown to include many renowned publications and companies throughout the world. He has received a number of awards and acclaim for his work and has published several photo books.
His life-long project is OYAKO (Japanese parents and children) photo series. In 2003, Bruce and his wife Yoshiko created the OYAKO Day social action and in 2014, a documentary film, OYAKO~ Present to the Future, was made about it. Recently he published his book An OYAKO: An Ode to Parents and Children which is available on Amazon.