Following the Mist at Dawn

This rare print shows a group of three Japanese soldiers, bayonets mounted on their rifles, moving carefully through a stand of reeds in early morning fog. Although undated, it is known from the publisher’s archives to have been made in 1937 at the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945). At that time, Japanese troops invaded much of the eastern coastal regions of China. Atmospheric and evocative, this is the only woodblock print by Kasamatsu Shirō known to depict a military subject.