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Paintings of the Atomic Bombing Complete
―High school students paint pictures of the A-bomb experience―
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Since 2007, with support from Hiroshima Municipal Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course, this Foundation has been involved in the creation of paintings of the atomic bombing.
The high school students work together with Atomic Bomb Witnesses to create pictures of the atomic bombing that communicate the situation at the time, depicting scenes from the atomic bombing that remain in the memories of the Atomic Bomb Witnesses.
This time, five witnesses and eleven students completed eleven paintings that they had been working on since 2018.
At the completion ceremony held at Motomachi High School gallery on July 1, 2019, five A-Bomb Witnesses attended, together with the students who created the paintings and other students in the Creative Expression Course, and others from this Foundation and Motomachi High School.
A student who depicted a scene of people fleeing to the outskirts of the city after the A-bomb was dropped and the people nearby who no longer had any energy to flee spoke about feelings during the process of creating the painting:
"It was very painful thinking about the story of each individual. I was struck by the deep sadness of the people who experienced the atomic bombing, and it was heart-wrenching."
Another student who made a painting of a person who experienced despair in the burning ruins in the city center and chose to wait to die said that for the student, who belongs to a generation that has never experienced war, it was impossible to imagine what it is like to go to die, or to wait to die, and the student had to show the painting many times to the teacher and look up materials from that time.
After much trial and error, and after listening to the A-Bomb witness's story a number of times, the student said that there was a change of feelings:
"I thought that I have to respect the feelings of the hibakusha who witnessed this scene. I thought that this is the best way to reconstruct that experience."
The paintings of the atomic bombing that were completed this time will be used to ensure that people have a deeper understanding of the A-bomb experience, by using the paintings when A-Bomb Witnesses are giving talks on their experiences.
The paintings will also be loaned out and offered as data images, to help pass on the reality of the damage from the atomic bombing to future generations.
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"Dazzling light"
by Mahiru Harada, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Keiko Ogura, Atomic Bomb Witness
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"Shed burning in the dark"
by Shinsaku Katsuragi, Motomachi High School
Creative Expression Course and Keiko Ogura
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"Black corpse left alone"
by Manaka Kawamoto, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Sadae Kasaoka, Atomic Bomb Witness
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"Where is my mother?"
by Marimo Kishi, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Sadae Kasaoka
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"People fleeing and people fallen"
by Miharu Ono, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Hiroaki Kawasaki, Atomic Bomb Witness
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"Despair: person waiting to die"
by Chiho Korenaga, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and
Noboru Sueoka, Atomic Bomb Witness
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"Arrival of wooden boxes to be used as coffins"
by Kazuyuki Saruta, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Noboru Sueoka
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"Corpse of a forgotten girl"
by Yumina Shimonishi, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Noboru Sueoka
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"Digging up the remains of family members"
by Yoko Negi, Motomachi High School Creative
Expression Course and Noboru Sueoka
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"Cremation of family members"
by Hanabi Kawamoto, Motomachi High School
CreativeExpression Course and Noboru Sueoka
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"The most important thing to me"
by Mei Fujiwara, Motomachi High School Creative Expression Course and Hiroshi Harada, Atomic Bomb Witness
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| (Peace Memorial Museum Outreach Division) |
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