Satoshi Murakami is a Tokyo-born artist whose practice often begins with the structures of everyday life—dwelling, movement, work, and the ways we navigate the world around us. With a background in architecture, he frequently uses his own body and actions as a way of testing and observing these systems.
Investigation Report of Visual Form and Reality focuses on the images we encounter before the food itself. Murakami photographs menu and package images, then pairs them with photographs of the food that actually appears after ordering or opening the package.
The book contains 457 pairs. Comparing the images on menus and packaging with the actual food reveals a wide range of discrepancies—from cases that are nearly identical to others where the quantity, shape, or color of the ingredients differs significantly.
The enlarged edition also includes a new essay of approximately 12,000 Japanese characters, titled I Don’t Know What I Want to Eat, further exploring the relationship between eating, choosing, desire, and images. Beginning with an everyday and often humorous observation, the book invites us to consider how images can influence, often unconsciously, the way we look at things and make choices.
Investigation Report of Visual Form and Reality (Enlarged Edition)
Satoshi Murakami / 村上慧
Bonchi Edition, 2025
210 × 242 × 10 mm
96 pages, color
Design: Akitsu Sekkei
