The title for this signed work, which the artist has inscribed in pencil in the righthand bottom margin, reads CROIX DANS LE COEUR, in French, above the Japanese inscription, 心の中 に 十字架 (kokoro no naka ni jūjika). We can presume that the original Japanese title was translated into French by Yoshida himself. This has been rendered directly from French into English to give the somewhat gnomic title, Cross in the Heart. The main question posed by this title is whether the ‘cross’ referred to carries religious overtones or not. In the Japanese title, 十字 (jūji),by itself, simply means the symbol for ‘ten’ (since the number 10 is written in the form of a cross). By extension, this symbolic ‘cross’ could be understood differently, for example as a targeting symbol found in the ‘crosshair’ sights of a rifle. One must then try to arrive at some sense in which that secular cross might be associated with the heart of the title, e.g. Aim for the Heart. However, the final character 架(ka – a frame or trestle) moves interpretation in the direction of the crucifix or Christian cross. Japan had a complex history following the introduction of Christianity, by Francis Xavier, around the middle of the 16th century and while the alien faith spread widely at first, subsequent suppression and persecution, under the Tokugawa Shogunate, led to the formation of an underground church that used the hidden ‘sign of the cross’ to practise their faith in secret. Although, historically, there were Christian churches in and around Osaka, where Yoshida grew up, there is little to suggest that he was raised a Christian, and his later professions of faith – although broadly ecumenical – are entirely consonant with Japanese Buddhist beliefs. It is possible that Yoshida was using the crucifix as an oblique symbolic reference to the suffering he survived during the war, much of which, particularly in Christian France where this work was created, necessarily remained buried deep within. It hardly needs observing that nowhere in the painting is an actual ‘cross’ depicted – although the diamond at the ‘heart’ of the image could notionally contain a black cross ‘hidden’ upon the black ground.