W. Eugene Smith (1918-1978)

W. Eugene Smith (1918-1978)

TOMOKO AND MOTHER IN THE BATH, MINAMATA, 1971. Silver gelatin print, printed c.1985, image size 13.5 x 21.3cm, caption, including Magnum distribution credit, typed directly onto print verso. As per the lengthy caption, this print was most likely used to publicise the 1985 publication of "W. Eugene Smith: Let Truth Be the Prejudice". The lengthy caption, which includes a short biography about Smith, notes distribution from the Magnum offices in Paris, with the addendum "NOT FOR PUBLICATION IN THE UNITED STATES".

The caption includes a description of the industrial mercury poisoning experienced by the Minamata community in the early 1970s; it also details the present image: "Tomako [sic] Uemura a 16 yr old fetal (congenital) minimata disease patient being bathed by her mother. She can neither see nor talk, yet remains a lump of breathing flesh loved by her mother."

Ex-collection of Robert Kirschenbaum