Fragment II

Fragment II juxtaposes images of Vietnamese families evacuating war-torn villages with references to consumerism: newspaper pages with stock-market quotes, classified listings, and advertisements for watches and audio equipment. The cacophony of heavily layered and partially-painted-over visuals suggests a commentary on the tension between the tragedy of human conflict and the exuberant consumerism of modern life. Mishima Kimiyo has insisted, however, that she was more interested in the formal qualities of these images than in their content. The gestural use of paint in Fragment II also demonstrates the relationship between Mishima and members of the Gutai Art Association, an avant-garde group of artists in Japan she was affiliated with early in her career.