Dr. Sataro Fukiage’s Clinic

The exploration of this isolated Japanese clinic in Hokkaido begins in front of a multi-story building whose reddish facade is peeling heavily under the harsh winter climate. The main entrance, half-buried beneath thick snowdrifts, opens into an interior that immediately plunges the visitor into an icy atmosphere.

The extreme cold has literally transformed the place: seeping water has frozen over, turning the staircases into treacherous ice rinks and forming heavy stalactites that hang beneath the stainless steel medical counters. On the ground floor, time seems to stand still around the glass-paneled reception desk and an old, bright red Coca-Cola vending machine that starkly stands out in the gloom. We also walk through a break room or waiting area featuring long black leather sofas, still cluttered with paperwork and manuals.

As we carefully make our way up the floors, abandoned medical equipment comes into view. The operating room remains the centerpiece, featuring an old surgical table topped by a massive operating lamp with bluish lenses. The physiotherapy wing, meanwhile, houses strange tubular rehabilitation structures standing in the middle of a flooded floor.

Everywhere, tiny details bear witness to the clinic’s past activity: X-ray films left out in plain sight, old glass bottles of disinfectant, vintage electrotherapy machines, and surgical instruments eaten away by rust on their metal trays. It is a striking step back into the 90s, confirmed by the presence of a 1995 calendar and a rusty wall clock whose hands are frozen forever.