Goddess statue Jikai at Ikeshima Coal Mine, bronze figure on a stone plinth with the winder house and headframe behind.
Goddess statue Jikai at Ikeshima Coal Mine, bronze figure on a stone plinth with the winder house and headframe behind.

Jikai and Headframe

Provenance

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

A bronze figure with one arm raised on a circular stone plinth. A planting bed at the base gone to dry grass and scrub. The winder house behind with broken windows and streaked concrete. The headframe with its sheave wheels leaning out over the roof at right. A rusted steel door in the lower wall.

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

A bronze figure with one arm raised on a concrete plinth, with the rusted steel headframe and winding house of Ikeshima Coal Mine visible behind it.A bronze figure with one arm raised on a concrete plinth, with the rusted steel headframe and winding house of Ikeshima Coal Mine visible behind it.A bronze figure with one arm raised on a concrete plinth, with the rusted steel headframe and winding house of Ikeshima Coal Mine visible behind it.A bronze figure with one arm raised on a concrete plinth, with the rusted steel headframe and winding house of Ikeshima Coal Mine visible behind it.A bronze figure with one arm raised on a concrete plinth, with the rusted steel headframe and winding house of Ikeshima Coal Mine visible behind it.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
Jikai and Headframe
Series
Ikeshima
Catalogue
IKE-035
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

The goddess statue Jikai (女神像 慈海) raises one arm from her circular stone plinth in the forecourt of the No. 2 shaft office at Ikeshima Coal Mine. Behind her the winding house rises on the left, its windows broken and its concrete streaked, and the headframe leans out over the roofline at right with its sheave wheels still mounted. A rusted steel door stands shut in the wall, and dry grass and low scrub have taken over the planting bed at her feet and the ground around the buildings. When the mine's new high-speed man-cars entered service in November 1996, the staff and their families voted to name them after her: Megami-gō and Jikai, the goddess and the merciful sea.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

The goddess statue Jikai (女神像 慈海) raises one arm from her circular stone plinth in the forecourt of the No. 2 shaft office at Ikeshima Coal Mine. Behind her the winding house rises on the left, its windows broken and its concrete streaked, and the headframe leans out over the roofline at right with its sheave wheels still mounted.

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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