Friends Forever

Friends Forever is an early self-published photobook by Kenta Cobayashi, documenting the young artists and friends who passed through his shared house in Shibuya, Tokyo.

The 56-page softcover book was self-published in Tokyo in 2014, part of a run of small, quickly produced photobooks — alongside titles such as Daydream and The Scrap — that Cobayashi issued outside any commercial publisher during the early years of his career. Cobayashi photographs his circle candidly and close-up, treating the shared house itself as a recurring subject.

Cobayashi has since become known for a more processed, glitch- and collage-based approach to color photography, shown internationally and applied to commercial work for brands including Louis Vuitton and Adidas. Friends Forever predates that shift, capturing his earlier, more straightforwardly documentary mode.