International Military Tribunal for the Far East 東京裁判

The men accused of war crimes sit limp and lifeless in the dock. These were the men who had led Japan into that insane war. This painting of Inoue, based on images taken from the record films of the time, was shown at "the Second Art Groups Joint Exhibition" of 1948, when the Tokyo Tribunal was still in session. In the following November，the sentences on the war criminals were given, including those of death by hanging for seven of "Drifting Hopelessly".
Inoue was active as a painter since before the war, pursuing pure painting in landscape along the line of Cezanne's theories and also producing works that quietly protested the war such as "Drifting Hopelessly on the Sea" (1943), which depicted Japanese soldiers in the South Pacific. His perceptive eye, which once captured the the human evil and the dark workings in the hidden aspects of history, was later turned to politics to produce a series of caricatures that feature ugly, droll figures drawn in vigorous lines with a distinctive humor. In this work which precedes that phase of his career, the gloomy colors and the expressionless faces of the figures eloquently convey the solemnity of the events that dominated the period, the defeat in war and the conviction of the war criminals.