AWARDS WINNERS 2018 Nov 2018

Title: Dekotora - Junichi Tajima

"For more than 40 years, Japanese truck drivers have been piling on lights, patterned fabrics, and other over-the-top adornments to their work trucks, creating moving masterpieces covered in LEDs. This tradition of decorated trucks or “Dekotora” originated from a 1970s Japanese movie series inspired by Smokey and the Bandit titled Torakku Yaro or “Truck Rascals.” In its heyday there were many thousands of dekotora drivers. Junichi Tajima, the subject of the image, runs a waste disposal company in Japan, but he is not a regular truck driver. He is one of an estimated 600 remaining dekotora drivers in Japan, owns three extravagantly decorated vehicles and is the head of the ‘Utamaro-Kai’, the national association of dekotora truck drivers. 

When I asked him what "Dekotora" means to him, he said: ‘After 40 years, "Dekotora" is my children, my brothers, my family’."