Accompanying the release of Martin Gusinde’s monograph L’Esprit des hommes de la Terre de Feu, Selk’nam, Yamana, Kawésqar, this portfolio includes 7 collotype prints produced by Benrido in Kyoto. The photographs present the secret rites of the Selk’nam Hain ceremony and of the Kawésqar Yincihaua ceremony.

Between 1918 and 1924, over four journeys to Tierra del Fuego, the German missionary Martin Gusinde became the only anthropologist who had been capable of conducting an in-depth study of the Selk’nam, Yamana, and Kawésqar. What might have remained simply a classic example of an ethnographic missionary’s journey emerges today as an unprecedented experience in the field. Martin Gusinde was deeply immersed within these societies, to the point of speaking the language and being introduced to the Hain initiation rite. The 1200 photographs he brought back with him constitute a unique testimonial on these populations that have now disappeared.

Collotype, a printing process developed in France approximately 150 years ago, allows a continuous tone process and a smooth rendering. The prints of remarkable quality are also very stable. Today, Benrido is one of the last workshops in the world to maintain and develop this traditional process.