Wash basins in the pithead bath at Ikeshima Coal Mine, rusted pipework and taps along two walls with sunlight on white tiles.
Wash basins in the pithead bath at Ikeshima Coal Mine, rusted pipework and taps along two walls with sunlight on white tiles.

Bath House Basins

Provenance

Camera
Nikon F100
Film
Fujifilm Velvia 50 · 35mm · ISO 50
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

Wash basins along two walls, each with a tap above it on a rusting pipe run. A crack running from the window frame across the wall. A patch of sunlight on small white floor tiles. A raised tiled platform on the left. Trees close against the windows outside.

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.
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In situ

Rusted concrete wash basins and a cracked rear wall inside an abandoned communal bathhouse at Ikeshima, with hard window light crossing the tiled floor.Rusted concrete wash basins and a cracked rear wall inside an abandoned communal bathhouse at Ikeshima, with hard window light crossing the tiled floor.Rusted concrete wash basins and a cracked rear wall inside an abandoned communal bathhouse at Ikeshima, with hard window light crossing the tiled floor.Rusted concrete wash basins and a cracked rear wall inside an abandoned communal bathhouse at Ikeshima, with hard window light crossing the tiled floor.Rusted concrete wash basins and a cracked rear wall inside an abandoned communal bathhouse at Ikeshima, with hard window light crossing the tiled floor.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
Bath House Basins
Series
Ikeshima
Catalogue
IKE-037
Process
Giclée
Captured
17 January 2026
Camera
Nikon F100
Film
Fujifilm Velvia 50
Format
35mm
Film ISO
50
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

Basins along two walls of the pithead bath in the No. 2 Shaft office building at Ikeshima Coal Mine, each one fed from a rusting pipe run with its tap still in place above it. A crack runs from the window frame across the wall, sunlight lands in a bright patch on the small white tiles, and a raised tiled platform fills the left of the floor. The pipework hangs from brackets beneath the windows, and trees have grown close enough outside to press against the glass. With 81 mine workers coming up in every wind of the cage, these basins would have been shoulder to shoulder at the end of a shift.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

Basins along two walls of the pithead bath in the No. 2 Shaft office building at Ikeshima Coal Mine, each one fed from a rusting pipe run with its tap still in place above it. A crack runs from the window frame across the wall, sunlight lands in a bright patch on the small white tiles, and a raised tiled platform fills the left of the floor.

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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