Main Guest Room

Provenance

Camera
NIKON D810
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Settings
14mm · f/9.0 · 1/10 · ISO 100
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm

A guest room at Kinugawa Kan. Tatami mats and a small lacquered cabinet remain largely undisturbed, and dust has settled across the room. Light filters through the paper panels of the shoji screens, which still hold their form in this former Japanese ryokan.

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

Main Guest Room at Kinugawa Kan, unframed print displayed in situ on a wall.Main Guest Room at Kinugawa Kan, white-framed print displayed in situ on a wall.Main Guest Room at Kinugawa Kan, black-framed print displayed in situ on a wall.Main Guest Room at Kinugawa Kan, raw timber-framed print displayed in situ on a wall.Main Guest Room at Kinugawa Kan, glass print displayed in situ on a wall.
01 PROVENANCE

Print datasheet

Title
Main Guest Room
Series
Kinugawa Kan
Catalogue
KKA-014
Process
Giclée
Captured
9 May 2016
Camera
NIKON D810
Lens
14.0-24.0 mm f/2.8
Aperture
f/9.0
Shutter
1/10 s
ISO
100
Focal length
14 mm
Paper
Ilford Galerie Smooth Cotton Rag 310 gsm
Paper size
290 × 200 mm
Location
Nikko, Tochigi, Japan
Recognised by
Highly Commended in Multimedia at the 2016 National Trust of Australia (NSW) Heritage Awards
02 LOCATION

Nikko, Tochigi, Japan

Map · Mapbox · OpenStreetMap

03 THE STORY

About this print

A guest room at Kinugawa Kan. The tatami mats and a small lacquered cabinet remain largely undisturbed, and dust has settled across the room. A solitary wooden table stands in the balcony doorway, with a display case holding a traditional doll and an open multi-compartment cabinet alongside. Light filters through the paper panels of the shoji screens, which still hold their form.

Rooms at Kinugawa Kan were booked for honeymoons, family events, and corporate retreats during the hotel's run. The Tokyo express train brought guests directly to Kinugawa from Asakusa in around two hours; from the station, the hotel sent a small shuttle van. Kinugawa Kan declared bankruptcy in June 1999, the first major ryokan in the gorge to close in the post-bubble period. The room in this photograph has been sealed since. The lacquered cabinet, the table and the original tatami remain, and the screens still hold their form.

04 FROM THE FIELD NOTES

Tatami mats line the floor of a corner guest room at Kinugawa Kan. Shoji screens stand open on two sides, their wooden lattice frames warped slightly from humidity. Beyond the balcony, dense green canopy presses close. A single stool sits near the curtain. A lacquered box rests on a low crate by the wall. Light falls soft and flat across the woven straw. A small cabinet holds a television set pushed against the right wall. The air in here is still and damp.

Brett Patman

Kinugawa Kan

The series

Kinugawa Kan

2016 · 22 photographs

Hoshi Takashi (星堯) incorporated Yugen-gaisha Kinukawa-kan Honten (有限会社きぬ川館本店) on 31 December 1942, on the Kinugawa River gorge in what is now Nikko City. The hotel grew to nine storeys, 70 guest rooms, one restaurant, and the Kappa-buro (かっぱ風呂) hot-spring bath on the river. In June 1999 the company filed for bankruptcy with debts of approximately 30億円, the first hotel at Kinugawa Onsen to fail in the post-bubble era.

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
TypeSizeWidthHeight
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