Despite the Snow the Japanese Army Perseveres to Hold Their Strong Position at Wei-hai-wei (Yuki o okashite waga gun Ikaiei no kenrui o nuku zu), Meiji period, dated 1895

One of multiple recorded impressions of this sensō-e depicting the Japanese Army's winter campaign at Wei-hai-wei (Weihaiwei) during the First Sino-Japanese War. The fortified naval installation in Shandong Province was captured by Japanese forces in February 1895 under difficult cold-weather conditions, and this print—issued the same year—presents that engagement for a domestic civilian audience. Falling or accumulated snow features as both meteorological condition and compositional element, structuring the tonal field of the print. Kiyochika's bokashi gradation work, applied to dampened washi paper during impression, would have been central to rendering the soft, diffuse light of overcast winter sky and the gentle tonal transitions across snow-covered ground. The composition belongs to the broad body of sensō-e that Kiyochika produced during the 1894–95 conflict, where he applied the atmospheric techniques developed in his earlier Tokyo landscape series to military subject matter. The existence of multiple impressions with the same title indicates the print was commercially produced in response to strong wartime demand for illustrated accounts of Japanese military campaigns.