Sex and the City: photos of Kohei Yoshiyuki taken in Tokyo night parks

It all started with the fact that one day, around the mid-70s, a young commercial photographer Kohei Yoshiyuki (Kohei Yoshiyuki) was walking at night through Chuo Park in the Shinjuku district — the most popular in Tokyo. Under one of the bushes, away from the alley, he saw a young couple having sex. After looking closely, the photographer realized that he was not the only one watching the sex - there were several other men nearby, watching the process with interest. This event was the beginning of a major project "Park", to which Yoshiyuki devoted more than one year and which eventually made him famous.

That very night, Kohei Yoshiyuki had a camera with him, but he couldn't use it — it was too dark in the park, and a flash could ruin everything. But later he found a way out of the situation — Kodak produced an infrared film that allowed him to shoot in the dark. It was she who allowed Yoshiyuki to hunt for heterosexual and homosexual couples in parks and squares even on moonless nights.

Very soon the young photographer became a real expert in the field of voyeurism. He noticed that the observers were trying to get as close to the couples in love as possible, and the most desperate even tried to touch them, risking serious problems.

Kohei Yoshiyuki had accumulated a lot of valuable photographic materials over several years of night vigils in Tokyo parks, and in 1979 he finally decided to share them. The photographer's first exhibition was held at Komai Gallery in Tokyo. It was unusual not only in its theme, but also in its design.

Yoshiyuki printed out his photos on large-format sheets so that the people on them were shown in full size. In the halls where the exposition was located, the lights were turned off, and visitors were given small flashlights at the entrance. So the author tried to immerse the guests in the atmosphere of the night park, made them feel like peeping.

After the end of the exhibition, the author personally burned all the pictures so as not to compromise their heroes. But just a year later, in 1980, he still made them common property, releasing a separate book.

The album was a bestseller for several years, but then interest in it faded. In 2020, Yoshiyuki published it again and the success was repeated — the circulation of the book sold out in a matter of days.

Where else could such a book be successful, if not in Japan, a country that is rightfully considered the birthplace of sexual perversions?