Tomoko and Mother in the Bath

Tomoko and Mother in the Bath^[1] is a photograph taken by American photojournalist W. Eugene Smith in 1971. Many commentators regard Tomoko as Smith's greatest work. The black-and-white photo depicts a mother cradling her severely deformed, naked daughter in a traditional Japanese bathroom. The mother, Ryoko Kamimura, agreed to deliberately pose the startlingly intimate photograph with Smith to illustrate the terrible effects of Minamata disease (a type of mercury poisoning) on the body and mind of her daughter Tomoko Kamimura. Upon publication the photo became world-famous, significantly raising the international profile of Minamata disease and the struggle of the victims for recognition and compensation. At the wishes of Tomoko Kamimura's family, the photograph was withdrawn from further publication in 1997, 20 years after Tomoko's death.

Although the subject's surname is "Kamimura",^[2] the photograph is commonly known as Tomoko Uemura in Her Bath. This stems from a misreading of the first kanji of the subject's surname Kamimura (上村). Other alternate names given for the photograph include Tomoko in Her Bath and Tomoko is Bathed by Her Mother.