Born in France, Nobuyoshi Takagi’s connection with Japan and its culture has been mostly mediated through his Japanese father. Currently engaged in a long-term project documenting his life, the zine “The Hawk and the Tall Tree” represents a quiet, dreamlike interlude that explores his father’s immigrant roots.
Composed of photographs taken during a trip to Japan in search of his father’s childhood roots, as well as his parents’ home in the Touraine region, Takagi presents a thoughtful series of straightforward snapshots and metaphorical images. Takagi and his father each inhabit two cultures – his father born in Japan and living in France for more than 50 years, Takagi born in France and raised in a French-Japanese household – with their shared biculturality expressed in different ways.

“In 2020, his mother (my grandmother) passed away, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we were unable to attend the funeral with the family. From then until 2024, I regularly visited my parents living in the Touraine region, documenting their daily lives. I focused particularly on the living room, kitchen, and garden. Over time, these spaces had clearly taken on a distinctly Japanese atmosphere. Within these spaces, filled with items found at flea markets and heirlooms brought back from Japan, I captured gestures, portraits, and details.

I felt compelled to observe and understand how my father maintained and nurtured his daily connection to his homeland's culture, filling the void created by being uprooted. Thus, he keeps his Japanese identity alive daily through cooking—a taste inherited from his father—language through conversations with family and friends, and reading and listening to Japanese via books and the internet.”
― from Nobuyoshi Takagi’s statement