Motoyuki Daifu’s photographs capture the chaos of family life

Who doesn’t love a good old-fashioned family album? There are heaps in photography, of course, since photography has become the “natural” medium of affection. While Japanese photographer Motoyuki Daifu’s family pictures undoubtedly brim with affection, they aren’t the kinds you’d find adorning the mantelpiece or piano. You will, however, find them in a newly-bound, bedside table-worthy photo book courtesy of publishers Little Big Man. The perfect home for such an intimate collection.

My family is a pubis so I cover them in pretty panties opens with a shot of a cluttered kitchen sink. We are in the five-room house Daifu, where his parents, four siblings and cat used to share in the suburbs of Yokohama, Japan. These pictures were made over a period of many years, and the fact of the pictures – the need to make them, the act of making them, the results of making them – certainly changed the relationships between them. “I think this work reflects the initial impulse of my life as an artist,” Daifu tells Dazed. “As a child, I had these pent-up feelings of discomfort towards my family. I didn’t have any space to myself, and was envious of classmates who did. Our relationships weren’t so good, and it was only when I started taking pictures of them that I took a step back to observe the ecology of my family… Family as other people.”

“As a child, I had these pent-up feelings of discomfort towards my family... It was only when I started taking pictures of them that I took a step back to observe the ecology of my family” – Motoyuki Daifu

Daifu was 19 years old when he first started chronicling life behind closed doors, and a few years later his family pictures made their first outing in Nikon Salon in Tokyo. Becoming a “bystander” not only allowed the young photographer to ward off any feelings of wearied familiarity towards his family, but also made the act of “airing their dirty laundry” less awkward or embarrassing, he suggests. Although domestic life has long been an intensely private affair in Japan, Daifu furnishes his gaze over these mundane, anti-Instagrammable moments with an unmistakable warmth and deadpan sense of humour.

“I am the eldest son,” says Daifu, introducing his family. “My mother enjoys her sleep, but her cooking isn’t very tasty. My father is quiet, unlike the eldest daughter, who is a busy body with lots of friends. The youngest brother loves car drifting, while the youngest sister is selfish and free.” The photographer calls them “characters” – a kind of ensemble who, together, acted out a version of their lives which is, here, up for consumption. And there’s a lot to consume. The stage is jam-packed with the Daifu’s debris: toys and toothbrushes, socks and chopsticks. As for the dirty dishes, they keep on coming: the prismatic gleams of soy and miso. Daifu seems to remind us that mess isn’t the enemy but, instead, something unavoidable and meaningful: the bedrock upon which the rest of life ebbs and flows.

“I never thought there was anything special about my family,” admits Daifu, who goes on to stress that there are still big families all over Japan. However, it’s also true to say that families in Japan are becoming smaller and smaller. Daifu’s parents were born in the first baby boom after WWII, and now the birth rate has fallen below replacement level, and decreasing each year. The explanation, according to Daifu? “Uncertainty about the future. Young people can’t afford children, so they have different priorities nowadays.”

While Daifu’s album might be destined to become a nostalgic ode to the big Japanese family, the photographer is clearly less interested in making any social statements than reckoning with his own complicated feelings about family life and photography. “The cat died a few years ago, and most of my siblings are now married or something,” he says. “It’s just my parents left, so they’re moving to a smaller house soon. It feels like a great coincidence that this house is being vacated just in time for the release of the book.”

And why, we ask, is Daifu’s drama so powerful? Partly because it took so long – 17 years to be exact. These snapshots belie the throw-away quality by which we have come to understand them. They have been assembled slowly, which is an invitation to look slowly, too. Flicking through these pages, you can feel the whiff of actual time, a reality that lies dormant under all the clutter we pile on top of it.

My family is a pubis so I cover them in pretty panties by Motoyuki Daifu is published by Little Big Man and available here.