Bombing of Japan

In WWII the United States did not join the war until Pearl Harbor was bombed on December 7, 1941. There has been much debate about wither the bombing was just or unjust. The Japanese did send us a letter which had the option to not drop the bomb if we sent the letter back in time, but Japan was also planning on dropping the bomb anyway. So this is why many people debate about the bomb dropped at Perl Harbor, but there is another bomb that is also equally debated about. The bombing of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.



The United States had been building this bomb for years and now since they were in the war fighting Japan and trying to stop them they believed this was the perfect time to use the Atomic bomb that they have built. This type of bomb had never been used before and they did not really know the exact power of it. In fairness to the Japanese the United States sent a letter stating that if they did not surrender then the United States would go to much more drastic measures. One thing we did not do that could be considered unjust was that we did not tell them that it was an Atomic bomb. If we wanted them to surrender why didn't we just say that we had an Atomic bomb and if you don't surrender we will drop it? Even if after that they did not surrender then it would be just to drop the bomb on Hiroshima.



Many people argue that the reason for dropping he bomb was to intimidate Russia. Russia was one of the United States allies but we were not on the best of terms with them and did not agree with them. Russia was also a large country and could take over China and Japan if we did not step in and stop the war. So was the bomb to intimidate Russia? or was it to stop the war more quickly and lessen the amount of deaths in the long run? Also by dropping the bomb and stopping the war it saved Japan from being taken over by Russia. There has not been an agreement on this question yet, but you can decide for you self if a) the bombing was just or unjust and b) the bombing was to stop the war or to intimidate Russia.

If you have any opinions or questions you can comment on this blog post and I will try and get back to you asap.

Interview with Brenda York

I interviewed Brenda York on Friday March 7, 2008. It was great interview that I felt I really got a lot out of. Mrs. York was really into her career of art. She is really inspired and dedicated to it. Mrs. York's artwork is very original and fun. They are all brightly colored and have a Brenda York flare to it.

Here is the results I got from my interview with Mrs. York. Mrs. York started her artist career when she was a little kid. She was always making art and drawing pictures of her friends in class. Instead of paying attention in math or any other class besides art she would draw. Mrs. York also studied art throughout college. Her inspiration is Picasso who is a cubist. Mrs. York likes to take different features of a head and make them her own. She does this by placing them in different places or making them different sizes. Mrs. York has always enjoyed drawing faces. She likes to take an eye or a nose and rearranging it.
Mrs. York also enjoys the artists: Reed Carnel who is a teacher in town, Maxphil Parish and Richard Diebenkorn. Mrs. York’s favorite form of art is abstract. She told me “she likes art that makes her smile”; she does not like art that is serious. Art should be fun and colorful.
I asked Mrs. York if she had any helpful hints on starting an art piece because I know that I have trouble sometimes starting. She gave me wonderful hint for starting an art piece. She says that the reason why people get so intimidated with starting an art piece is the white canvas. The white canvas feels too blank and people don’t know where to start from blank, so she pants all of her canvases black first. This gets hers started with something simple and helps her not feel as intimidated. I thought that this was a brilliant idea and it made me feel like she really knew what she was talking about.
Mrs. York always knew she was an artist but she never knew how being an artist could be a job, she still isn’t sure. To help her get started she took graphic design which she was not crazy about. The graphic design soon led her to her artist career today. Mrs. York meets artists through galleries, painting classes, art shows and online. The best thing about art to Mrs. York is spending time with her daughter in her studio and having long talks also the other best thing about art to her is that it is her passion. Brenda York would paint even if it did not bring in money because she loves doing it and it makes her happy. I feel that that makes her a true artist, loving it and doing it even if it was not her job.

Mrs. York is an amazing artist one of my favorite art pieces of hers is "A Spot of Bother In the Garden" which is her version of Adam and Eve.

view more of Brenda Yorks art at her website: www.brendayork.com

Japan during WWII

In 1926 Hirohito became Emperor of Japan. Hirohito creates a "Peace Preservation Department" in 1926-1928. This presevation department limted peoples rights and freedoms and made the whole Japanese commuinty huge. Everyone is at the same level. This system prosecuted the local communitsts. After this new way of living and thinking Japan grew and expanded. This made them more powerful and larger.

Soon Japan gets into the expantion process and wants to take over China. The only problem was that Japan had no reason to attack China, so they plan a bombing of one of the Japanese railroad tracks that runs through China. They blame the Chinese for the explosion and attack. The area that Japan attcks is called Machuria which they declare their own and take over. Soon the Japanese enter Nanking, China in 1937. In Nanking they rape, mutilate and murder 200,000 to 300,000 people. This is around half of the city. This marks the beinging of the Sino- Japanese War.

The United States soon steps in and stops all of Japan's oil and military supplies and grants support to China. In 1941 Hideki Tojo becomes Prime Minister of Japan. Tojo says to the United States that if there is no agreement between them that they will attack. The Unites States does not agree, so the bombing of Perl Harbor happens on Decmeber 7, 1941.

This brings the United States officially into the war. Many soldiers are killed, and many battles fought. Through all of the fights and battles the Japanese were losing a lot of people and soliders but they were not giving up. The United States was obviously wining with three battles won out of five. The Japanese did not seem themselves as losing so they kept fighting. President Truman finally had to drop a bomb in Hirosima on August 6, 1945, and a second bomb on August 8, 1945 in Nagaski. Even with the bombing Japan does not surrender.

With everything falling apart the Emperor finally surrenders on August 13, 1945! August 15, 1945 was called V-J day- victory of Japan.

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2129.html - this is a good website that I found if you would like to learn more about Japan during WWII.

Experiment in art

I have been experimenting with art for the past few weeks. I have kept an art journal and have been drawing sketches in it for about three weeks. I have a couple of pieces that I really like and feel I can turn into a real piece of art. While drawing these sketches every day I learned what kinds of mediums I like to use for art. My personal preference is using colored pencils. You make the shades of the colors light or dark depending on the amount of force or pressure you put onto the pencil. Also if you make a mistake you can somewhat erase it. I made an art piece related to a poem that I wrote and I did it all in colored pencil. I had darker colors and lighter colors and I blended colors also. I feel that I can do a lot with colored pencils, more than I can with paint. I did one of my sketches in my art journal with watercolor and I did not like the feel of the blending and how runny the colors were. I think if maybe I used acrylics it would have made it easier to paint a picture. I have really started to like art and have taken an interest in it.

This weekend I am interviewing an artist, Brenda York. She has a wonderful website and has made quite a living for herself. I am going to ask her questions about how she started her artist career and what her inspirations to paint are. If you would like to see some of Mrs. York's art I would suggest visiting her website; www.brendayork.com She is a very talented artist! I will also post the information I receive from my interview in a blog post next week.

I am really glad that I have been experimenting with art and paints because I have taken an interest in it. I may one day want to be an artist or just draw or paint for fun! We will see.

Diary of Anne Frank

The Diary of Anne Frank is a diary that was published written by a 13 year old girl. It tells of her life being Jewish during WWII and the difficult times. I read a couple of passages from her diary and I found one quote that really stuck out to me. On page 63 she writes "Children coming home find their parents have disappeared While I was reading this expert I was shocked to find the things Anne Frank was talking about like the children or the rules that the Jewish had to follow. This quote is mentioned when Anne is talking to her diary about how terrible the day was. The reason why I like this quote is because I can relate to it. I can imagine being a child during the time of WWII and coming home and seeing that my parents were not there and did not eventually show up. This thought scares me and must have scared the children. I cannot imagine what life would be like with out my parents and knowing that they are never coming back. This is why this quote stood out to me and moved me because I can relate to it because I am a child with parents.

What did the children do once they knew that their parents were gone? Were they scared to go out and find a friend or someone to help knowing the Nazi’s could catch them? Did these children die, because of lack of care and food supply? Did they eventually get taken away? The children of this time are what really interest me about WWII and the concentration camps.

If you have any answers to my questions or you know more information about Anne Frank and would like to show me I would love to hear what you have to say! Just leave me a comment!

Equality!

Did you know that equality can mean something different to each person!? It does not always mean everyone has equal rights in society. The typical definition of equality is; the condition of being equal. Everyone in the society shares equally in society's assets. Meeting basic needs- employment, housing, education, health care- is highly valued. Look back at WWII and you can see that the views of the American's and the views of the Soviet's on equality are very different.

The Americans believed that equality is when everyone has the chance to succeed, when everyone is treated the same way by the legal system and when everyone shares equally in the material wealth and society. The last equality is not as important to the United States as the first two. Equality is very important to the United States, during the Cold War we made changes to the equality of opportunity and the equality before the law.

The Soviet's (Russian's) believed that equality in condition was the most important for a healthy society. The United States did not. The soviets argued that a society has to share its material wealth with its people so no one has an unfair advantage. During the Cold War they gave employment, health care and other necessities to their citizens. Even though they said that everyone got equal opportunity that was not true. The top Communist Party officials got the best housing, health care, automobiles and food before any of the other citizens. This was not equality!

I was surprised to hear about the difference in the views of equality from different countries, because when I think of equality I think: everyone is equal no matter what and we all have the same rights. In different countries this word may be defined as something totally different. If you have other words that you know that may appear or are defined differently in other places please comment on my blog and let me know! Thank You!

Art in the Interwar Era

My first post this week I wrote that Ernst and Margritte were realist artists, well I was wrong they are really surrealists. Surrealism is an expression of subconscious mind, a personal and cultural revolution, anti-war, anti-modern movement, irrationality was antidote of national thought. This type of art was popular during the 1920's and 30's. Some other types of art is expressionism, cubism, dadaism and precisionism.

Expressionism occurred during the early 20th century. Expressionism's characteristics are bold colors, distorted forms, two-demential, mood emphases over representation. The movement was encouraged by the social upheaval of WWII. Some artists are Kandinsky, Munch and Klee.

Cubism occurred from 1900's- 1910's. The technique of this art style is that it depicts objects/figures from multiple perspectives at once., subject in greater context, shallow depth of field, which meant intersection of subject and background, political in nature. Some examples of artist that used cubism are Picasso, Gris and Baraque.

Here are some examples of art pieces!

Cubism:

Expressionism:

I hope you learned a little about some of the art during the Interwar era!!