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01 Ashio Copper MineAshio2016
ISO 1001/25f/9.019mm
Series · 24 prints
Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap
Furukawa Ichibei acquired the Ashio mine in 1877 with financial backing from Shibusawa Eiichi. By 1922 the operation had consolidated its three separate ore-processing plants into one. The Tsudō Ore-Dressing Plant, on the Watarase River, was held up at home and abroad as a model facility for metal mines.
METI's 2007 register of modern industrial heritage carries the plant as item 02 of Story 12, the Ashio modernisation and pollution-prevention narrative. The 2008 National Historic Site designation, by contrast, covers the mine shafts and the smelter but leaves the dressing plant unlisted.
Inside, the process ran top-to-bottom by gravity. Raw ore dropped through hoppers, then through hand-riveted ball mills, then into timber froth flotation cells dating from 1918. At one of the hoppers, the ore is still piled around the spade in the position the operator left it.
The Ashio mine closed in 1973 and the dressing plant stopped with it. The buildings sit on Furukawa Machinery & Metals private land, not publicly accessible. Water still runs through the PVC pipes inside under gravity, likely part of the environmental controls keeping contaminated water out of the Watarase.
Nippon.com (Ashio Copper Mine), UNU Press (Ashio Pollution Case) and Association for Asian Studies (Nation Versus People)
Hand-signed limited editions, printed from the original RAW file. Editions run from 100 down to 25 and are not reissued once they sell through.
Made to order by Brett in Sydney, from the original RAW file. Each print is hand-signed and numbered before it ships.
Paper
Ilford Galerie cotton rag, 310 gsm. Acrylic on metallic gloss, 260 gsm.
Lead time
Unframed: 5 to 10 business days. Framed and acrylic: 10 to 20.
Often I'd find myself looking at the machines and architecture and challenging myself to find one single object designed purely for aesthetics. Craftsmanship made way for efficiency in engineering long before I'd even left school.
The Guardian
On the LC archive.
People talk about what it was like to work or stay in these places, who they knew, what they did, how great the Christmas parties were, that store man nobody liked, what all the different machines were, how they worked and what became of them.
Broadsheet
On the LC archive.
There's this sense of wonder you get when looking at abandoned buildings. You try to imagine what these spaces were like when they were filled with busy workers trying to meet production targets. And why did they close?
The Guardian
On the LC archive.