Preface by Isamu Yoshida

preface

Souvenir Photograph Commemorating My Enlisting into the 23rd Osaka Unit

October, 23, 1944

Photo on the Right: Nobuhide, my elder Brother, on a horse

Family Photo:

On the right: Isamu

Man in the chair: My Late Father, Yutaro

Woman next to him: My Late Mother, Sumie

On the left: Kimiko, my younger Sister

Greetings

I have been given the opportunity to publish a collection of my drawings that express thoughts concerning my military service record. Although I abandoned my paintbrush long time ago, I have picked it up once more. Recently, I have heard a lot about the need for armaments again. However, as one who was directly involved in the war, I strongly believe that a war should never happen anymore. Now, I am working on drawing on my memory of the records and on creating a collection of a "volume for Manchuria" and a "volume for Siberia." The total number of such drawings has come to more than 250. The collection that I am publishing now represents a hundred works from that larger set.

The war ended some time ago. However, a while ago, when there was a war, the anguish and anger that has been shown in these drawings was real. I tried my best to follow my memory, and I drew each scene as realistically as I could. The land in Siberia, in my experience, was a world of only black and white, both in reality and in our perception. It was just an image like lead.

Both in Manchuria and in the frozen soil in Siberia, vast numbers of brethren and comrades had to become, without any choice, a part of that soil. Their tears stopped flowing, and their dispair became fathomless. I pray for the repose of their souls from the bottom of my heart.