A Japanese traditional style painter Hojo Rakushi (北條楽只), now at the age of 66 and living in Ichikawa-misato town of Yamanashi prefecture, recently completed his work “ハワイ日本人・日系人歴史絵巻 (Hawai’i Nippon-jin Nikkei-jin Rekishi Emaki /The Picture scrolls of the history between Hawai’i and Japan)”.
The Emaki is made of 34 scrolls. Its length is 620 meters. He painted 120 thousands of people of Hawai’i and Japan. Every scene is captioned in English and Japanese. The artist started to paint this work in 1996. He had been to Hawai’i at least 2 times in a year for the background research.
The Emaki starts in the scene of 13th century Hawai’i (there is a legend that some Japanese sailors in Middle Ages drifted to Hawai’i) and ends in the scene of the arrival of Hokule’a at Yokohama. Mr. Hojo explains this “I think the arrival of the canoe is the best scene to end up this work”.
Now the work is on exhibit in Ichikawa-misato town. The artist plans to exhibit this in Hawai’i.
