The Shibuya Photo Archive Exhibition 2026 (渋谷アーカイブ写真展2026), titled "Streets and Voices" (渋谷の通りと、語られた記憶／Streets and Voices), runs for 14 days from Tuesday, November 10 to Monday, November 23, 2026 (a national holiday) at 8/COURT on the 8th floor of Shibuya Hikarie. It is organized by Commons Archive Collective (コモンズ・アーカイブ・コレクティブ, hereafter CAC).
Held since 2023, this is the fourth edition. Under the theme of Shibuya's streets and the memories told about them, the exhibition shows 186 photographs that record the townscape of the Taisho, Showa and Heisei eras, along with "SHIBUYA TIMELINE 2.0," a historical timeline of Shibuya starting in prehistoric times. As a first for the series, it also presents oral history (spoken records). The project aims to record memories that were never written down and to reread the ever-changing "city" through the "town" that people actually experienced.
The book Shibuya Shoshitsu Jiten (渋谷消失事典), which collects shops, facilities, place names and landscapes that have vanished from Shibuya, goes on sale in advance at the venue only. Through photos, audio, a timeline and a book, the exhibition presents the layers of records that make up a city.
Official website: https://spae2026.studio.site/
Tracing the Shibuya That Photos Did Not Capture
At the exhibitions CAC has held since 2023, old photographs have prompted visitors to share memories of the town that could not be learned from photos or documents alone. In the 2025 edition, CAC's research on the "named streets of Shibuya" (名づけられた渋谷の通り) focused on how street names reflect people's daily lives and how some have been passed down through oral tradition. Building on this, the 2026 exhibition attempts oral history, aiming to record not only the scenery left in photographs but also the memories of the people who lived there.
Even today, when a huge amount of information is available online, a memory that exists only in one person's mind cannot be searched for or referenced by AI as material unless it is recorded. CAC also saves the recorded audio as text and accumulates it as archive material that can be used in the future. This effort to record memories that were left out of the record, and to reread the ever-changing "city" through the "town" people experienced, is a new step in CAC's ongoing archive activities.
Listening to 10 Stories of Shibuya Through a Telephone Receiver
"Shibuya Oral History" (渋谷オーラルヒストリー) consists of 10 stories based on interviews with 12 people who have lived, worked, played and nurtured culture in Shibuya. The stories are rooted in personal experience: gyoza eaten in Koibumi Yokocho (恋文横丁), vacant lots and parking lots that children used as playgrounds, the young people who gathered in Center Gai in the 1990s, and the arts and culture handed down in the hanamachi (geisha district) of Maruyama-cho (円山町).
To create an experience of listening closely to each person's story, CAC built original fixtures equipped with a telephone receiver, a tool for listening to a human voice. The screen shows the content of each story in Japanese and English text. Visitors can imagine the Shibuya scenes the narrators experienced while sensing the intonation and pauses in their voices.
A list of the narrators and story summaries is available on the official website.
Comments From Architect Hiroshi Naito
On November 9, the day before the exhibition opened, architect Hiroshi Naito (内藤廣) gave the commemorative lecture "Shibuya's Memories and the Shibuya of Memory" (渋谷の記憶と記憶の渋谷). Overlaying the exhibited photos with the social conditions of each era, he drew on the educational philosophy of Tama Art University, where he serves as president, "Freedom and Iryoku" (自由と意力), to speak about the free spirit of Shibuya that has not been lost through changing times.
Naito also said that "Shibuya's DNA is not dead" even as redevelopment continues, stressing that the free atmosphere created by the people of the town is the value of Shibuya. Speaking about the significance of archives, he said that recalling the past through photographs becomes an opportunity to think about what matters for the town's future.
Note: "Iryoku" (意力) refers to the willpower to create unique expression and the strong force needed to sustain it.
Photos, a Timeline and a Dictionary: Shibuya's Changes From Many Angles
In addition to oral history, the exhibition combines records of different kinds, including photographs, maps, a historical timeline and publications.
186 Photos of "Named Streets of Shibuya"
CAC's research has found about 70 "named streets" within roughly 1 km of Shibuya Station. The exhibition displays photos sorted into 32 of them. New additions in 2026 include photos of the Shibuya Station building from the late Taisho era and of the Seibu Shibuya store when it opened.
The map showing where each photo was taken also lists street names that do not appear in the exhibited photos. Each photo carries a QR code that opens the shooting location in Google Street View, so visitors can compare the scenery of the past with how the place looks now.
SHIBUYA TIMELINE 2.0
This timeline gives an overview of Shibuya from prehistoric times to the present. It follows the town's changes over a long span, from its topography, rivers and the formation of its roads to the opening of railways, the growth of commerce and culture, and redevelopment. It shows how the land influenced people's lives and how those lives in turn shaped the town.
Shibuya Shoshitsu Jiten (渋谷消失事典)
Shibuya is undergoing large-scale redevelopment, but it has always been a town of constant turnover, where bases for diverse activities appear and disappear. CAC is publishing Shibuya Shoshitsu Jiten, a book collecting 374 entries on shops, facilities, place names and landscapes that have been lost from Shibuya over roughly the past 100 years and that remain in the memories of the people who lived in each era. Ahead of its general release in December 2026, it is sold in advance at the venue only.
- Title: Shibuya Shoshitsu Jiten 2026, 1st Edition (渋谷消失事典 2026年 第1版)
- Format: B6 portrait, 64 pages
- Price: ¥900 (excluding tax)
- General release: From December 2026 (online shop)
Exhibition Details
- Event: Shibuya Photo Archive Exhibition 2026 (渋谷アーカイブ写真展2026)
- Dates: Tuesday, November 10 to Monday, November 23, 2026 (national holiday)
- Hours: 11:00 AM to 8:00 PM (closes at 6:00 PM on the final day)
- Venue: 8/COURT, 8th floor, Shibuya Hikarie, 2-21-1 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo
- Admission: Free
- Organizer: Commons Archive Collective
- Co-organizer: Shibuya Dogenzaka Shopping Street Promotion Association (渋谷道玄坂商店街振興組合)
- Supported by: Shibuya City (渋谷区)
- Website: https://spae2026.studio.site/
