A student of Harry Callahan and Aaron Siskind, Yasuhiro Ishimoto is an important figure in the cross-pollination of photographic ideas and styles between American and Japanese photography. His portrait of a city, Chicago, Chicago, published as a book (1969), is a rich study full of the details of time and place. The cluster of white mannequin busts in the background of one of his photographs highlights Ishimoto’s strength in using environmental details to question or add subtle commentary about the individuals portrayed – and about their relationship to society at large. The documentary photographer is forced to be part of the time and place of his subject, a fact of the medium that is simultaneously restrictive and beneficial. Moving through Chicago as both citizen and visitor, Yasuhiro Ishimoto was able to create documents that speak eloquently for the culture of the city in the 1950s and 60s. His photographs present highly original visual spaces, which nonetheless suggest the politics, mentality, and history of the city. Another untitled image from this series shows Ishimoto’s strict sense of form and distinctive vision that can absorb such obvious urban phenomena as a plethora of advertisements…

http://www.mocp.org/collections/permanent/ishimoto_yasuhiro.php