Blue boat on the grass in Ikeshima-machi painted with Ganbare Nippon, a handmade Hello Kitty inside the hull.
Blue boat on the grass in Ikeshima-machi painted with Ganbare Nippon, a handmade Hello Kitty inside the hull.

Ganbare Nippon

Provenance

Camera
Nikon F100
Film
Cinestill 800T · 35mm · ISO 800
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

A small blue fibreglass boat on grass, its paint worn. Japanese lettering hand-painted along the hull, the first word in black and the second in red. A handmade white Hello Kitty inside the boat beside a weathered grey float and a length of green pipe. Grass growing through and around the hull. The balconies of an apartment block out of focus behind in low evening light.

Edition
Open edition

Open edition
Printed to order, no fixed quantity. Each print is hand-signed by the photographer.

Limited edition
A fixed number of prints exist. Once sold, the edition closes permanently. Each print is individually numbered and signed.

$100.00 AUD
Size
Type
Colour
✓
Signed, numbered, with COA. Made to order in 5 to 10 business days (unframed). Shipped in protective packaging with edition certificate, paper-stock reference and a printed care guide.
See certificate sample →

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In situ

A weathered blue boat with ガンバレ日本 painted on its hull rests on dry grass at Ikeshima, a handmade Hello Kitty inside and a concrete apartment block behind.A weathered blue boat with ガンバレ日本 painted on its hull rests on dry grass at Ikeshima, a handmade Hello Kitty inside and a concrete apartment block behind.A weathered blue boat with ガンバレ日本 painted on its hull rests on dry grass at Ikeshima, a handmade Hello Kitty inside and a concrete apartment block behind.A weathered blue boat with ガンバレ日本 painted on its hull rests on dry grass at Ikeshima, a handmade Hello Kitty inside and a concrete apartment block behind.A weathered blue boat with ガンバレ日本 painted on its hull rests on dry grass at Ikeshima, a handmade Hello Kitty inside and a concrete apartment block behind.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
Ganbare Nippon
Series
Ikeshima
Catalogue
IKE-012
Process
Giclée
Captured
17 January 2026
Camera
Nikon F100
Film
Cinestill 800T
Format
35mm
Film ISO
800
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Location
Ikeshima, Nagasaki, Japan
Recognised by
Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards
02 LOCATION

Ikeshima, Nagasaki, Japan

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

A small blue fibreglass boat sits on the grass beside a road in Ikeshima-machi, its hull hand-painted with ガンバレ日本, Ganbare Nippon, ガンバレ in black and 日本 in red. Ganbare is the call to hang in there and see something hard through to the end, and Ganbare Nippon says it to the whole country: it is the cheer for Japan's teams at the Olympics, and in 2011, after the earthquake and tsunami, it was everywhere. A handmade Hello Kitty peers over the gunwale from inside, beside a weathered grey float and a length of green pipe, and grass has grown up through and around the hull. Behind it, out of focus, the balconies of an apartment block catch the low evening light. Nobody has put to sea in this boat for a long time.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

A small blue fibreglass boat sits on the grass beside a road in Ikeshima-machi, its hull hand-painted with ガンバレ日本, Ganbare Nippon, ガンバレ in black and 日本 in red. A handmade Hello Kitty peers over the gunwale from inside, beside a weathered grey float and a length of green pipe, and grass has grown up through and around the hull.

Brett Patman

Ikeshima

The series

Ikeshima

1959 to 2001 · 54 photographs

Ikeshima Coal Mine operated beneath the seabed off Nagasaki from 1959 until 29 November 2001, making it the last new coal mine to open in Japan and the last large-scale underground colliery to close. At its 1970 peak the island held 7,770 residents on a 0.86 km² rock in the Gotō Sea, housed in company-built concrete towers above a mine that reached 650 m below sea level.

View all in this series →

05 SIZE GUIDE

Print sizes

The anatomy view shows what this finish is as a physical object: paper margin, mat band, frame depth, acrylic profile. The comparison strip shows how each size sits relative to the others at true scale. Click a size or a finish to update both.

Anatomy · true ratio
07 MORE FROM IKESHIMA

53 other prints in this series

All prints
Dim office at Ikeshima Coal Mine, a white hard hat and a cup on two desks below a buckled venetian blind.
Hard Hat$100.00
View from an apartment window in Ikeshima-machi, utility pole and wires above silver grass with the Matsushima power station chimney across the sea.
Apartment Window$100.00
Window in the No. 2 Shaft office at Ikeshima Coal Mine, glass gone and a creeper hanging in over the sill above the sea.
Ocean Outlook$100.00
Pithead bath in the No. 2 Shaft office at Ikeshima Coal Mine, concrete troughs on a tiled floor with a vent fan on the far wall.
Pithead Bath$100.00
08 BY POST · NO SPAM

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