Pacific—Shattered Blue
パシフィック — シャタード・ブルー
- Birth Year
- 1959
- Death Year
- -
- Date
- 1997
- Technique, Material, Format
- glass plates pasted on screenprint on muslin, mounted on plywood
- Dimension
- 210.0 x 300.0 x 7.0 cm
- Donor name
- Sambi Shosha (Mr. Ueda Kuniaki and Mrs. Ueda Katsuko)
- Category
- Print by Japanese Artist
- Inventory Number
- 2007-PRJ-002
This large map with the north-south axis reversed was taken from the 1891 book Kaigai Shokumin-Ron (A Treatise on Foreign Colonization). The Japanese archipelago is on the lower right, with shipping routes extending from Yokohama to the Americas, Australia, the South Seas Islands, and China. Placed on top of the map are fragments of glass printed with underwater photos of cargo ships and fighter planes destroyed during World War II, as well as the battleship Nagato, which was sunk during a nuclear test at Bikini Atoll in 1946.
After opening its ports in 1859, modern Japan’s process of reconnecting with other countries across the sea sometimes involved military aggression. The "shattered blue" in the title is perhaps a reference to this sea. A Meiji Era (1868–1912) map overlaid with photographs of Showa Era (1926–1989) relics, the work gives contemporary expression to the Pacific Ocean’s accumulation of historical suffering.
(SAKAMOTO Kyoko)