Photo/Illutration Chihiro Iwasaki’s “Little Dogs and Children on a Rainy Day” (Provided by Chihiro Art Museum)

Children are geniuses at play.

A crosswalk becomes a suspension bridge in the valley. Overstepping any of the crosswalk’s painted white lines means you go tumbling off the bridge. So, everyone hops from one white line to the next.

When it rains, it’s sports day on a classroom window. Kids guess which raindrop will reach the goal first.

I recalled these memories of my long-past childhood after I saw an exhibition of works by Chihiro Iwasaki (1918-1974) at the Chihiro Art Museum in Tokyo’s Nerima Ward. The event was titled “ASOBO” (literally, “Let’s play”).

Iwasaki typically painted watercolor pictures of young children with plump cheeks and jet-black eyes. Done in soft pastels, every child is adorable and looks a tad wistful.

Their fleeting facial expressions overlap my recollections of myself as a child and of my children.

Iwasaki died on Aug. 8 exactly half a century ago. She was 55.

She sought peace and happiness for children. I find it an interesting coincidence that her date of death should fall between the Hiroshima atomic bomb memorial day and the Nagasaki atomic bomb memorial day.

After graduating from a women’s high school, Iwasaki moved to the former Manchuria as a teacher for members of the “women’s pioneer volunteer corps.”

She returned to Japan, but her home was burnt down in an air raid and she evacuated to Nagano Prefecture.

After the end of World War II, Iwasaki studied under Toshi Maruki (1912-2000), a Japanese artist best known for her “Genbaku no Zu” (Hiroshima Panels) series of paintings.

Iwasaki once said, “I truly love things that are peaceful, enriching, beautiful and endearing, and I feel infinite rage at any force that tries to destroy them.”

I think she was someone who could always go back to being a child, whatever age she might have been.

That reminds me of the words of Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941): “God waits for man to regain his childhood in wisdom.”

Late in life, Iwasaki became ill. The last time she picked up a paintbrush in bed, she colored the eyes of a baby she hadn’t finished painting yet.

The baby looks straight at me. What are you trying to tell me?

—The Asahi Shimbun, Aug. 8

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Vox Populi, Vox Dei is a popular daily column that takes up a wide range of topics, including culture, arts and social trends and developments. Written by veteran Asahi Shimbun writers, the column provides useful perspectives on and insights into contemporary Japan and its culture.

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