Japan Medical Photographs From 1900

[Mulboyne]

The Dr. Ikkaku Ochi Collection: Medical Photographs from Japan Around 1900

In an inconspicuous wooden box that had long gone unopened, Akimitsu Naruyama discovered 365 photographs of people with congenital and pathological deformations...A doctor and photography enthusiast, Ikkaku Ochi practiced his profession in Okayama, a prefecture of Shikoku, one of Japan's southern islands. He had his patients photographed during the last decade of the 19th century, producing images that are strikingly distinct from contemporary medical photographs, which serve as mere educational material and rarely as sensitive portraits of the diseased. Ochi's patients were recorded with dignity and respect, though the exposed, diseased parts of their bodies are explicitly documented and not for the squeamish...Cruel and melancholic, these photographs seen today possess an undeniable elegance and uncomfortable beauty, qualities that Akimitsu Naruyama recognized immediately

There have been exhibitions of these photographs around the world - one at the Fotomuseum Winterthur a couple of years ago. Some of these pictures are on the web on the following links. They are uncomfortable viewing.
http://www.saez.ch/pdf/2004/2004-37/2004-37-857.PDF
http://www.schaden.com/book/NarAkiDr03454.html
http://www.artandmedicine.com/about/2004/Hydrocephaly1.html
http://www.artandmedicine.com/about/2004/Hydrocephaly2.html