NISHIMURA Arakichi
Born: 6 June 1879 – Died: 9 February 1942
Particulars:
Arakichi was born in Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan. He was working as a lay brother at the Catholic mission in the then New Hebrides, now Vanuatu, when the Pacific War broke out. He was taken to Australia and interned at Hay Internment Camp in New South Wales. He died less than three weeks later at the Hay Hospital aged 62. His grave is in the Japanese Cemetery in Cowra, New South Wales, Australia.
–Mayu Kanamori
More info:
Taka Takiguchi
Artist/s Statement:
Dear Arakichi Nishimura,
Welcome back to Hiroshima. This may seem sudden, but I remember when I was in my second year of junior high school in 1990, I stayed at a training facility in Etajima for three days and two nights on a school excursion. I couldn’t sleep because the navy facilities nearby felt eerie and unsettling. 90 years earlier in 1900, you left Hiroshima at the age of 21. Somehow, you became a Catholic lay priest. I would love to hear your story one day.
A single blossom seen
I steal its scent
a tangerine flower
–Chizuko Shigeta
My grandmother composed this haiku. She grew up in Shōbara, Hiroshima, the northern part of Hiroshima. I wonder where she saw mikan (mandarins) blossoming. Nishimura san, you may have grown surrounded by the fragrance of Hiroshima mikans in Etajima, and my grandmother, composing a haiku about mikan blossoms — this poem was chosen with a sense of the time that connects you two through Hiroshima’s mikans.
Welcome back, indeed.
Sincerely, Taka Takiguchi
Artist Bio:
Taka Takiguchi (滝口貴) is an independent artist and producer of Japanese (Hiroshima) heritage related stories based in Naarm / Melbourne, Australia. His practice delves into personal stories, places, their historical contexts, and our presence within them today. He explores relational phenomena – between memory, time, and language – bringing them to life through poetry, scriptwriting, and movement based techniques, including the Suzuki Method, Butoh, and shamanic/trance dance. His late grandmother’s thousands of haiku and handwritten journals remain a constant source of inspiration for his passion for writing poetry.