title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 30 June, Tōgō told Naotake Satō, Japan's ambassador in Moscow, to try to establish "firm and lasting relations of friendship." Satō was to discuss the status of Manchuria and "any matter the Russians would like to bring up." Well aware of the overall situation and cognizant of their promises to the Allies, the Soviets responded with delaying tactics to encourage the Japanese without promising anything. Satō finally met with Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov on 11 July, but without result. On 12 July, Tōgō directed Satō to tell the Soviets that:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The Emperor proposed sending Prince Konoe as a special envoy, although he would be unable to reach Moscow before the Potsdam Conference.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Satō advised Tōgō that in reality, "unconditional surrender or terms closely equivalent thereto" was all that Japan could expect. Moreover, in response to Molotov's requests for specific proposals, Satō suggested that Tōgō's messages were not "clear about the views of the Government and the Military with regard to the termination of the war," thus questioning whether Tōgō's initiative was supported by the key elements of Japan's power structure.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: American cryptographers had broken most of Japan's codes, including the Purple code used by the Japanese Foreign Office to encode high-level diplomatic correspondence. As a result, messages between Tokyo and Japan's embassies were provided to Allied policy-makers nearly as quickly as to the intended recipients. Fearing heavy casualties, the Allies wished for Soviet entry in the Pacific War at the earliest possible date. Roosevelt had secured Stalin's promise at Cairo, which was re-affirmed at Yalta. That outcome was greatly feared in Japan.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Security concerns dominated Soviet decisions concerning the Far East. Chief among these was gaining unrestricted access to the Pacific Ocean. The year-round ice-free areas of the Soviet Pacific coastline—Vladivostok in particular—could be blockaded by air and sea from Sakhalin island and the Kurile Islands. Acquiring these territories, thus guaranteeing free access to the Soya Strait, was their primary objective. Secondary objectives were leases for the Chinese Eastern Railway, Southern Manchuria Railway, Dairen, and Port Arthur.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: To this end, Stalin and Molotov strung out the negotiations with the Japanese, giving them false hope of a Soviet-mediated peace. At the same time, in their dealings with the United States and Britain, the Soviets insisted on strict adherence to the Cairo Declaration, re-affirmed at the Yalta Conference, that the Allies would not accept separate or conditional peace with Japan. The Japanese would have to surrender unconditionally to all the Allies. To prolong the war, the Soviets opposed any attempt to weaken this requirement. This would give the Soviets time to complete the transfer of their troops from the Western Front to the Far East, and conquer Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, northern Korea, South Sakhalin, the Kuriles, and possibly Hokkaidō (starting with a landing at Rumoi).


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The leaders of the major Allied powers met at the Potsdam Conference from 16 July to 2 August 1945. The participants were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States, represented by Stalin, Winston Churchill (later Clement Attlee), and Truman respectively.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Although the Potsdam Conference was mainly concerned with European affairs, the war against Japan was also discussed in detail. Truman learned of the successful Trinity test early in the conference and shared this information with the British delegation. The successful test caused the American delegation to reconsider the necessity and wisdom of Soviet participation, for which the U.S. had lobbied hard at the Tehran and Yalta Conferences. High on the United States' list of priorities was shortening the war and reducing American casualties—Soviet intervention seemed likely to do both, but at the cost of possibly allowing the Soviets to capture territory beyond that which had been promised to them at Tehran and Yalta, and causing a postwar division of Japan similar to that which had occurred in Germany.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: In dealing with Stalin, Truman decided to give the Soviet leader vague hints about the existence of a powerful new weapon without going into details. However, the other Allies were unaware that Soviet intelligence had penetrated the Manhattan Project in its early stages, so Stalin already knew of the existence of the atomic bomb but did not appear impressed by its potential.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: It was decided to issue a statement, the Potsdam Declaration, defining "Unconditional Surrender" and clarifying what it meant for the position of the emperor and for Hirohito personally. The American and British governments strongly disagreed on this point—the United States wanted to abolish the position and possibly try him as a war criminal, while the British wanted to retain the position, perhaps with Hirohito still reigning. Furthermore, although it would not initially be a party to the declaration, the Soviet government also had to be consulted since it would be expected to endorse it upon entering the war. Assuring the retention of the emperor would change the Allied policy of unconditional surrender and necessitated consent from Stalin. The American Secretary of State James Byrnes, however, wanted to keep the Soviets out of the Pacific war as much as possible and persuaded Truman to delete any such assurances. The Potsdam Declaration went through many drafts until a version acceptable to all was found.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 26 July, the United States, Britain and China released the Potsdam Declaration announcing the terms for Japan's surrender, with the warning, "We will not deviate from them. There are no alternatives. We shall brook no delay." For Japan, the terms of the declaration specified:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Contrary to what had been intended at its conception, the Declaration made no mention of the Emperor at all. Secretary of State Joseph Grew had advocated for retaining the emperor as a constitutional monarch. He hoped that preserving Hirohito's central role could facilitate an orderly capitulation of all Japanese troops in the Pacific theatre. Without it, securing a surrender could be difficult. Navy Secretary James Forrestal and other officials shared the view. Allied intentions on issues of utmost importance to the Japanese, including whether Hirohito was to be regarded as one of those who had "misled the people of Japan" or even a war criminal, or alternatively, whether the Emperor might become part of a "peacefully inclined and responsible government" were thus left unstated.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The "prompt and utter destruction" clause has been interpreted as a veiled warning about American possession of the atomic bomb (which had been tested successfully on the first day of the conference). On the other hand, the declaration also made specific references to the devastation that had been wrought upon Germany in the closing stages of the European war. To contemporary readers on both sides who were not yet aware of the atomic bomb's existence, it was easy to interpret the conclusion of the declaration simply as a threat to bring similar destruction upon Japan using conventional weapons.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 27 July, the Japanese government considered how to respond to the Declaration. The four military members of the Big Six wanted to reject it, but Tōgō, acting under the mistaken impression that the Soviet government had no prior knowledge of its contents, persuaded the cabinet not to do so until he could get a reaction from Moscow. The cabinet decided to publish the declaration without comment for the time being. In a telegram, Shun'ichi Kase, Japan's ambassador to Switzerland, observed that "unconditional surrender" applied only to the military and not to the government or the people, and he pleaded that it should be understood that the careful language of Potsdam appeared "to have occasioned a great deal of thought" on the part of the signatory governments—"they seem to have taken pains to save face for us on various points." The next day, Japanese newspapers reported that the Declaration, the text of which had been broadcast and dropped by leaflet into Japan, had been rejected. In an attempt to manage public perception, Prime Minister Suzuki met with the press, and stated:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Chief Cabinet Secretary Hisatsune Sakomizu had advised Suzuki to use the expression . Its meaning is ambiguous and can range from "refusing to comment on" to "ignoring (by keeping silence)". What was intended by Suzuki has been the subject of debate. Tōgō later said that the making of such a statement violated the cabinet's decision to withhold comment.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 30 July, Ambassador Satō wrote that Stalin was probably talking to Roosevelt and Churchill about his dealings with Japan, and he wrote: "There is no alternative but immediate unconditional surrender if we are to prevent Russia's participation in the war." On 2 August, Tōgō wrote to Satō: "it should not be difficult for you to realize that ... our time to proceed with arrangements of ending the war before the enemy lands on the Japanese mainland is limited, on the other hand it is difficult to decide on concrete peace conditions here at home all at once."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 6 August at 8:15 AM local time, the "Enola Gay", a Boeing B-29 Superfortress piloted by Colonel Paul Tibbets, dropped an atomic bomb (code-named Little Boy by the U.S.) on the city of Hiroshima in southwest Honshū. Throughout the day, confused reports reached Tokyo that Hiroshima had been the target of an air raid, which had leveled the city with a "blinding flash and violent blast". Later that day, they received U.S. President Truman's broadcast announcing the first use of an atomic bomb, and promising:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The Japanese Army and Navy had their own independent atomic-bomb programs and therefore the Japanese understood enough to know how very difficult building it would be. Therefore, many Japanese and in particular the military members of the government refused to believe the United States had built an atomic bomb, and the Japanese military ordered their own independent tests to determine the cause of Hiroshima's destruction. Admiral Soemu Toyoda, the Chief of the Naval General Staff, argued that even if the United States had made one, they could not have many more. American strategists, having anticipated a reaction like Toyoda's, planned to drop a second bomb shortly after the first, to convince the Japanese that the U.S. had a large supply.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At 04:00 on 9 August word reached Tokyo that the Soviet Union had broken the Neutrality Pact, declared war on Japan, subscribed to the Potsdam Declaration and launched an invasion of Manchuria.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: These "twin shocks"—the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the Soviet entry—had immediate profound effects on Prime Minister Kantarō Suzuki and Foreign Minister Shigenori Tōgō, who concurred that the government must end the war at once. However, the senior leadership of the Japanese Army took the news in stride, grossly underestimating the scale of the attack. With the support of Minister of War Anami, they started preparing to impose martial law on the nation, to stop anyone attempting to make peace. Hirohito told Kido to "quickly control the situation" because "the Soviet Union has declared war and today began hostilities against us."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The Supreme Council met at 10:30. Suzuki, who had just come from a meeting with the Emperor, said it was impossible to continue the war. Tōgō said that they could accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration, but they needed a guarantee of the Emperor's position. Navy Minister Yonai said that they had to make some diplomatic proposal—they could no longer afford to wait for better circumstances.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: In the middle of the meeting, shortly after 11:00, news arrived that Nagasaki, on the west coast of Kyūshū, had been hit by a second atomic bomb (called "Fat Man" by the United States). By the time the meeting ended, the Big Six had split 3–3. Suzuki, Tōgō, and Admiral Yonai favored Tōgō's one additional condition to Potsdam, while General Anami, General Umezu, and Admiral Toyoda insisted on three further terms that modified Potsdam: that Japan handle their own disarmament, that Japan deal with any Japanese war criminals, and that there be no occupation of Japan.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The full Japanese cabinet met at 14:30 on 9 August, and spent most of the day debating surrender. As the Big Six had done, the cabinet split, with neither Tōgō's position nor Anami's attracting a majority. Anami told the other cabinet ministers that under torture a captured American P-51 Mustang fighter pilot, Marcus McDilda, had told his interrogators that the United States possessed a stockpile of 100 atom bombs and that Tokyo and Kyoto would be destroyed "in the next few days".


title: Surrender of Japan

text: In reality the United States would not have had a third bomb ready for use until around 19 August, and a fourth in September. However the Japanese leadership had no way to know the size of the United States' stockpile, and feared the United States might have the capacity not just to devastate individual cities, but to wipe out the Japanese people as a race and nation. Indeed, Anami expressed a desire for this outcome rather than surrender, asking if it would "not be wondrous for this whole nation to be destroyed like a beautiful flower".


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The cabinet meeting adjourned at 17:30 with no consensus. A second meeting lasting from 18:00 to 22:00 also ended with no consensus. Following this second meeting, Suzuki and Tōgō met the Emperor, and Suzuki proposed an impromptu Imperial conference, which started just before midnight on the night of 9–10 August. Suzuki presented Anami's four-condition proposal as the consensus position of the Supreme Council. The other members of the Supreme Council spoke, as did Kiichirō Hiranuma, the President of the Privy Council, who outlined Japan's inability to defend itself and also described the country's domestic problems, such as the shortage of food. The cabinet debated, but again no consensus emerged. At around 02:00 (10 August), Suzuki finally addressed Emperor Hirohito, asking him to decide between the two positions. The participants later recollected that the Emperor stated:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: According to General Sumihisa Ikeda and Admiral Zenshirō Hoshina, Privy Council President Hiranuma then turned to the Emperor and asked him: "Your majesty, you also bear responsibility () for this defeat. What apology are you going to make to the heroic spirits of the imperial founder of your house and your other imperial ancestors?"


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Once the Emperor had left, Suzuki pushed the cabinet to accept the Emperor's will, which it did. Early that morning (10 August), the Foreign Ministry sent telegrams to the Allies (by way of Max Grässli at the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs ) announcing that Japan would accept the Potsdam Declaration, but would not accept any peace conditions that would "prejudice the prerogatives" of the Emperor. That effectively meant no change in Japan's form of government—that the Emperor of Japan would remain a position of real power.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The Allied response to Japan's qualified acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration was written by James F. Byrnes and approved by the British, Chinese, and Soviet governments, although the Soviets agreed only reluctantly. The Allies sent their response (via the Swiss Foreign Affairs Department) on 12 August. On the status of the Emperor it said:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: President Truman issued instructions that no further atomic weapons were to be dropped on Japan without presidential orders, but allowed military operations (including the B-29 firebombings) to continue until official word of Japanese surrender was received. However, news correspondents incorrectly interpreted a comment by General Carl Spaatz, commander of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in the Pacific, that the B-29s were not flying on 11 August (because of bad weather) as a statement that a ceasefire was in effect. To avoid giving the Japanese the impression that the Allies had abandoned peace efforts and resumed bombing, Truman then ordered a halt to all further bombings.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The Japanese cabinet considered the Allied response, and Suzuki argued that they must reject it and insist on an explicit guarantee for the imperial system. Anami returned to his position that there be no occupation of Japan. Afterward, Tōgō told Suzuki that there was no hope of getting better terms, and Kido conveyed the Emperor's will that Japan surrender. In a meeting with the Emperor, Yonai spoke of his concerns about growing civil unrest:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: That day, Hirohito informed the imperial family of his decision to surrender. One of his uncles, Prince Asaka, then asked whether the war would be continued if the "kokutai" (imperial sovereignty) could not be preserved. The Emperor simply replied "of course."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At the suggestion of American psychological operations experts, B-29s spent 13 August dropping leaflets over Japan, describing the Japanese offer of surrender and the Allied response. The leaflets, some of which fell upon the Imperial Palace as the Emperor and his advisors met, had a profound effect on the Japanese decision-making process. It had become clear that a complete and total acceptance of Allied terms, even if it meant the dissolution of the Japanese government as it then existed, was the only possible way to secure peace. The Big Six and the cabinet debated their reply to the Allied response late into the night, but remained deadlocked. Meanwhile, the Allies grew doubtful, waiting for the Japanese to respond. The Japanese had been instructed that they could transmit an unqualified acceptance in the clear, but instead they sent out coded messages on matters unrelated to the surrender parlay. The Allies took this coded response as non-acceptance of the terms.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Via Ultra intercepts, the Allies also detected increased diplomatic and military traffic, which was taken as evidence that the Japanese were preparing an "all-out banzai attack." President Truman ordered a resumption of attacks against Japan at maximum intensity "so as to impress Japanese officials that we mean business and are serious in getting them to accept our peace proposals without delay." In the largest and longest bombing raid of the Pacific War, more than 400 B-29s attacked Japan during daylight on 14 August, and more than 300 that night. A total of 1,014 aircraft were used with no losses. B-29s from the 315 Bombardment Wing flew to destroy the Nippon Oil Company refinery at Tsuchizaki on the northern tip of Honshū. This was the last operational refinery in the Japanese Home Islands, and it produced 67% of their oil. The attacks continued right through the announcement of the Japanese surrender, and indeed for some time afterwards.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Truman had ordered a halt to atomic bombings on 10 August, upon receiving news that another bomb would be ready for use against Japan in about a week. He told his cabinet that he could not stand the thought of killing "all those kids." By 14 August, however, Truman remarked "sadly" to the British ambassador that "he now had no alternative but to order an atomic bomb dropped on Tokyo," as some of his military staff had been advocating.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: As 14 August dawned, Suzuki, Kido, and the Emperor realized the day would end with either an acceptance of the American terms or a military coup. The Emperor met with the most senior Army and Navy officers. While several spoke in favor of fighting on, Field Marshal Shunroku Hata did not. As commander of the Second General Army, the headquarters of which had been in Hiroshima, Hata commanded all the troops defending southern Japan—the troops preparing to fight the "decisive battle". Hata said he had no confidence in defeating the invasion and did not dispute the Emperor's decision. The Emperor asked his military leaders to cooperate with him in ending the war.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At a conference with the cabinet and other councilors, Anami, Toyoda, and Umezu again made their case for continuing to fight, after which the Emperor said:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The cabinet immediately convened and unanimously ratified the Emperor's wishes. They also decided to destroy vast amounts of material pertaining to war crimes and the war responsibility of the nation's highest leaders. Immediately after the conference, the Foreign Ministry transmitted orders to its embassies in Switzerland and Sweden to accept the Allied terms of surrender. These orders were picked up and received in Washington at 02:49, 14 August.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Difficulty with senior commanders on the distant war fronts was anticipated. Three princes of the Imperial Family who held military commissions were dispatched on 14 August to deliver the news personally. Prince Tsuneyoshi Takeda went to Korea and Manchuria, Prince Yasuhiko Asaka to the China Expeditionary Army and China Fleet, and Prince Kan'in Haruhito to Shanghai, South China, Indochina and Singapore.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The text of the Imperial Rescript on surrender was finalized by 19:00 August 14, transcribed by the official court calligrapher, and brought to the cabinet for their signatures. Around 23:00, the Emperor, with help from an NHK recording crew, made a gramophone record of himself reading it. The record was given to court chamberlain Yoshihiro Tokugawa, who hid it in a locker in the office of Empress Kōjun's secretary.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Late on the night of 12 August 1945, Major Kenji Hatanaka, along with Lieutenant Colonels Masataka Ida, Masahiko Takeshita (Anami's brother-in-law), and Inaba Masao, and Colonel Okikatsu Arao, the Chief of the Military Affairs Section, spoke to War Minister Korechika Anami (the army minister and "most powerful figure in Japan besides the Emperor himself"), and asked him to do whatever he could to prevent acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration. General Anami refused to say whether he would help the young officers in treason. As much as they needed his support, Hatanaka and the other rebels decided they had no choice but to continue planning and to attempt a coup d'état on their own. Hatanaka spent much of 13 August and the morning of 14 August gathering allies, seeking support from the higher-ups in the Ministry, and perfecting his plot.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Shortly after the conference on the night of 13–14 August at which the surrender finally was decided, a group of senior army officers including Anami gathered in a nearby room. All those present were concerned about the possibility of a coup d'état to prevent the surrender—some of those present may have even been considering launching one. After a silence, General Torashirō Kawabe proposed that all senior officers present sign an agreement to carry out the Emperor's order of surrender—"The Army will act in accordance with the Imperial Decision to the last." It was signed by all the high-ranking officers present, including Anami, Hajime Sugiyama, Yoshijirō Umezu, Kenji Doihara, Torashirō Kawabe, Masakazu Kawabe, and Tadaichi Wakamatsu. "This written accord by the most senior officers in the Army ... acted as a formidable firebreak against any attempt to incite a coup d'état in Tokyo."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Around 21:30 on 14 August, Hatanaka's rebels set their plan into motion. The Second Regiment of the First Imperial Guards had entered the palace grounds, doubling the strength of the battalion already stationed there, presumably to provide extra protection against Hatanaka's rebellion. But Hatanaka, along with Lt. Col. Jirō Shiizaki, convinced the commander of the 2nd Regiment of the First Imperial Guards, Colonel Toyojirō Haga, of their cause, by telling him (falsely) that Generals Anami and Umezu, and the commanders of the Eastern District Army and Imperial Guards Divisions were all in on the plan. Hatanaka also went to the office of Shizuichi Tanaka, commander of the Eastern region of the army, to try to persuade him to join the coup. Tanaka refused, and ordered Hatanaka to go home. Hatanaka ignored the order.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Originally, Hatanaka hoped that simply occupying the palace and showing the beginnings of a rebellion would inspire the rest of the Army to rise up against the move to surrender. This notion guided him through much of the last days and hours and gave him the blind optimism to move ahead with the plan, despite having little support from his superiors. Having set all the pieces into position, Hatanaka and his co-conspirators decided that the Guard would take over the palace at 02:00. The hours until then were spent in continued attempts to convince their superiors in the Army to join the coup. At about the same time, General Anami committed "seppuku," leaving a message that, "I—with my death—humbly apologize to the Emperor for the great crime." Whether the crime involved losing the war, or the coup, remains unclear.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At some time after 01:00, Hatanaka and his men surrounded the palace. Hatanaka, Shiizaki, Ida, and Captain Shigetarō Uehara (of the Air Force Academy) went to the office of Lt. General Takeshi Mori to ask him to join the coup. Mori was in a meeting with his brother-in-law, Michinori Shiraishi. The cooperation of Mori, as commander of the 1st Imperial Guards Division, was crucial. When Mori refused to side with Hatanaka, Hatanaka killed him, fearing Mori would order the Guards to stop the rebellion. Uehara killed Shiraishi. These were the only two murders of the night. Hatanaka then used General Mori's official stamp to authorize Imperial Guards Division Strategic Order No. 584, a false set of orders created by his co-conspirators, which would greatly increase the strength of the forces occupying the Imperial Palace and Imperial Household Ministry, and "protecting" the Emperor.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The palace police were disarmed and all the entrances blocked. Over the course of the night, Hatanaka's rebels captured and detained eighteen people, including Ministry staff and NHK workers sent to record the surrender speech.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The rebels, led by Hatanaka, spent the next several hours fruitlessly searching for Imperial House Minister Sōtarō Ishiwata, Lord of the Privy Seal Kōichi Kido, and the recordings of the surrender speech. The two men were hiding in the "bank vault", a large chamber underneath the Imperial Palace. The search was made more difficult by a blackout in response to Allied bombings, and by the archaic organization and layout of the Imperial House Ministry. Many of the names of the rooms were unrecognizable to the rebels. The rebels did find the chamberlain Yoshihiro Tokugawa. Although Hatanaka threatened to disembowel him with a samurai sword, Tokugawa lied and told them he did not know where the recordings or men were.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At about the same time, another group of Hatanaka's rebels led by Captain Takeo Sasaki went to Prime Minister Suzuki's office, intent on killing him. When they found it empty, they machine-gunned the office and set the building on fire, then left for his home. Hisatsune Sakomizu, the chief secretary to Suzuki's Cabinet, had warned Suzuki, and he escaped minutes before the would-be assassins arrived. After setting fire to Suzuki's home, they went to the estate of Kiichirō Hiranuma to assassinate him. Hiranuma escaped through a side gate and the rebels burned his house as well. Suzuki spent the rest of August under police protection, spending each night in a different bed.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Around 03:00, Hatanaka was informed by Lieutenant Colonel Masataka Ida that the Eastern District Army was on its way to the palace to stop him, and that he should give up. Finally, seeing his plan collapsing around him, Hatanaka pleaded with Tatsuhiko Takashima, Chief of Staff of the Eastern District Army, to be given at least ten minutes on the air on NHK radio, to explain to the people of Japan what he was trying to accomplish and why. He was refused. Colonel Haga, commander of the 2nd Regiment of the First Imperial Guards, discovered that the Army did not support this rebellion, and he ordered Hatanaka to leave the palace grounds.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Just before 05:00, as his rebels continued their search, Major Hatanaka went to the NHK studios, and, brandishing a pistol, tried desperately to get some airtime to explain his actions. A little over an hour later, after receiving a telephone call from the Eastern District Army, Hatanaka finally gave up. He gathered his officers and walked out of the NHK studio.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At dawn, Tanaka learned that the palace had been invaded. He went there and confronted the rebellious officers, berating them for acting contrary to the spirit of the Japanese army. He convinced them to return to their barracks. By 08:00, the rebellion was entirely dismantled, having succeeded in holding the palace grounds for much of the night but failing to find the recordings.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Hatanaka, on a motorcycle, and Shiizaki, on horseback, rode through the streets, tossing leaflets that explained their motives and their actions. Within an hour before the Emperor's broadcast, sometime around 11:00, 15 August, Hatanaka placed his pistol to his forehead, and shot himself. Shiizaki stabbed himself with a dagger, and then shot himself. In Hatanaka's pocket was his death poem: "I have nothing to regret now that the dark clouds have disappeared from the reign of the Emperor."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Emperor Hirohito gave different reasons to the public and the military for the surrender: When addressing the public, he said, "the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is, indeed, incalculable ... . Should we continue to fight, not only would it result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization." When addressing the military, he did not mention the "new and most cruel bomb" but rather said that "the Soviet Union has entered the war against us, [and] to continue the war ... would [endanger] the very foundation of the Empire's existence."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: At 12:00 noon Japan Standard Time on 15 August, the Emperor's recorded speech to the nation, reading the Imperial Rescript on the Termination of the War, was broadcast:


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The low quality of the recording, combined with the Classical Japanese language used by the Emperor in the Rescript, made the recording very difficult to understand for most listeners. In addition, the Emperor did not explicitly mention surrender in his speech. To prevent confusion the recording was immediately followed by a clarification that Japan was indeed unconditionally surrendering to the Allies.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Public reaction to the Emperor's speech varied—many Japanese simply listened to it, then went on with their lives as best they could, while some Army and Navy officers chose suicide over surrender. A small crowd gathered in front of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo and cried, but as author John Dower notes, the tears they shed "reflected a multitude of sentiments ... anguish, regret, bereavement and anger at having been deceived, sudden emptiness and loss of purpose".


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On 17 August, Suzuki was replaced as prime minister by the Emperor's uncle, Prince Higashikuni, perhaps to forestall any further coup or assassination attempts.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Japan's forces were still fighting against the Soviets as well as the Chinese, and managing their cease-fire and surrender was difficult. The last air combat by Japanese fighters against American reconnaissance bombers took place on 18 August. The Soviet Union continued to fight until early September, taking the Kuril Islands.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Two days after Emperor Hirohito's surrender speech to civilians was broadcast, he delivered a shorter speech "To the officers and men of the imperial forces". He said, "Three years and eight months have elapsed since we declared war on the United States and Britain. During this time our beloved men of the army and navy, sacrificing their lives, have fought valiantly ..., and of this we are deeply grateful. Now that the Soviet Union has entered the war against us, to continue the war under the present internal and external conditions would be only to increase needlessly the ravages of war finally to the point of endangering the very foundation of the Empire's existence. With that in mind and although the fighting spirit of the Imperial Army and Navy is as high as ever, with a view to maintaining and protecting our noble national policy we are about to make peace with the United States, Britain, the Soviet Union and Chungking. ... We trust that you officers and men of the Imperial forces will comply with our intention and will ... bear the unbearable and leave an everlasting foundation of the nation."


title: Surrender of Japan

text: News of the Japanese acceptance of the surrender terms was announced to the American public via radio at 7 p.m. on 14 August, sparking massive celebrations. Allied civilians and servicemen everywhere rejoiced at the news of the end of the war. A photograph, "V-J Day in Times Square", of an American sailor kissing a woman in New York, and a news film of the "Dancing Man" in Sydney have come to epitomize the immediate celebrations. 14 and 15 August are commemorated as Victory over Japan Day in many Allied countries.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Japan's sudden surrender after the unexpected use of atomic weapons surprised most governments outside the US and UK. The Soviet Union had some intentions of occupying Hokkaidō. Unlike the Soviet occupations of eastern Germany and northern Korea, however, these plans were frustrated by the opposition of President Truman.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: In the aftermath of Japan's declaration of surrender, US B-32 Dominator bombers based in Okinawa began flying reconnaissance missions over Japan in order to monitor Japanese compliance with the cease-fire, gather information to better enable the establishment of the occupation, and test the fidelity of the Japanese, as it was feared that the Japanese were planning to attack occupation forces. During the first such B-32 reconnaissance mission, the bomber was tracked by Japanese radars but completed its mission without interference. On 18 August, a group of four B-32s overflying Tokyo were attacked by Japanese naval fighter aircraft from Naval Air Facility Atsugi and Yokosuka Naval Airfield. The Japanese pilots were acting without authorization from the Japanese government. They were either opposed to the cease-fire or believed that Japanese airspace should remain inviolate until a formal surrender document was signed. They caused only minor damage and were held at bay by the B-32 gunners. The incident surprised US commanders, and prompted them to send additional reconnaissance flights to ascertain whether it was an isolated attack by die-hards acting independently or if Japan intended to continue fighting. The following day, two B-32s on a reconnaissance mission over Tokyo were attacked by Japanese fighter aircraft out of Yokosuka Naval Airfield, with the pilots again acting on their own initiative, damaging one bomber. One of the bomber's crewmen was killed and two others wounded. It was the last aerial engagement of the war. The following day, as per the terms of the cease-fire agreement, the propellers were removed from all Japanese aircraft and further Allied reconnaissance flights over Japan went unchallenged.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Japanese officials left for Manila on 19 August to meet Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers Douglas MacArthur, and to be briefed on his plans for the occupation. On 28 August 150 US personnel flew to Atsugi, Kanagawa Prefecture, and the occupation of Japan began. They were followed by , whose accompanying vessels landed the 4th Marines on the southern coast of Kanagawa. The 11th Airborne Division was airlifted from Okinawa to Atsugi Airdrome, from Tokyo. Other Allied personnel followed.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: MacArthur arrived in Tokyo on 30 August, and immediately decreed several laws: No Allied personnel were to assault Japanese people. No Allied personnel were to eat the scarce Japanese food. Flying the "Hinomaru" or "Rising Sun" flag was severely restricted.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The formal surrender occurred on 2 September 1945, around 9 a.m., Tokyo time, when representatives from the Empire of Japan signed the Japanese Instrument of Surrender in Tokyo Bay aboard USS "Missouri". The dignitaries or representatives from around the world were carefully scheduled to board USS "Missouri". Japanese Foreign Minister Shigemitsu signed for the Japanese government, while for the Japanese armed forces.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The surrender ceremony was carefully planned on board USS "Missouri" detailing the seating positions of all Army, Navy, and Allied Representatives. The ceremony was filmed in color by George F. Kosco, but the footage was released publicly only in 2010.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Each signatory sat before an ordinary mess deck table covered with green felt and signed two unconditional Instruments of Surrender—a leather-bound version for the Allied forces and a canvas-backed version for the Japanese. Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signed on behalf of the Japanese government followed by the uniformed General Yoshijiro Umezu, Chief of the Imperial General Staff. MacArthur signed on behalf of the Allied nations, followed by Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz as U.S. Representative. Representatives of eight other Allied nations, led by Chinese representative General Xu Yongchang, followed Nimitz. Other notable signatories include Admiral Bruce Fraser for the United Kingdom, and Général d'armée Philippe Leclerc de Hauteclocque for France.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: On "Missouri" that day was the same American flag that had been flown in 1853 on by Commodore Matthew C. Perry on the first of his two expeditions to Japan. Perry's expeditions had resulted in the Convention of Kanagawa, which forced the Japanese to open the country to American trade.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: After the formal surrender on 2 September aboard "Missouri", investigations into Japanese war crimes began quickly. Many members of the imperial family, such as his brothers Prince Chichibu, Prince Takamatsu and Prince Mikasa, and his uncle Prince Higashikuni, pressured the Emperor to abdicate so that one of the Princes could serve as regent until Crown Prince Akihito came of age. However, at a meeting with the Emperor later in September, General MacArthur assured him he needed his help to govern Japan and so Hirohito was never tried. Legal procedures for the International Military Tribunal for the Far East were issued on 19 January 1946, without any member of the imperial family being prosecuted.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: In addition to 14 and 15 August, 2 September 1945, is also known as V-J Day. President Truman declared 2 September to be V-J Day, but noted that "It is not yet the day for the formal proclamation of the end of the war nor of the cessation of hostilities." In Japan, 15 August is often called (), which literally means the 'memorial day for the end of the war', but the government's name for the day (which is not a national holiday) is (, 'day for mourning of war dead and praying for peace').


title: Surrender of Japan

text: A nearly simultaneous surrender ceremony was held on 2 September aboard at Truk Atoll, where Vice Admiral George D. Murray accepted the surrender of the Caroline Islands from senior Japanese military and civilian officials.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Following the signing of the instrument of surrender, many further surrender ceremonies took place across Japan's remaining holdings in the Pacific. Japanese forces in Southeast Asia surrendered on 2 September 1945, in Penang, 10 September in Labuan, 11 September in the Kingdom of Sarawak and 12 September in Singapore. The Kuomintang took over the administration of Taiwan on 25 October. It was not until 1947 that all prisoners held by America and Britain were repatriated. As late as April 1949, China still held more than 60,000 Japanese prisoners. Some, such as Shozo Tominaga, were not repatriated until the late 1950s.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The logistical demands of the surrender were formidable. After Japan's capitulation, more than 5,400,000 Japanese soldiers and 1,800,000 Japanese sailors were taken prisoner by the Allies. The damage done to Japan's infrastructure, combined with a severe famine in 1946, further complicated the Allied efforts to feed the Japanese POWs and civilians.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: The state of war between most of the Allies and Japan officially ended when the Treaty of San Francisco took effect on 28 April 1952. The same day this treaty took effect, Japan formally made peace with the Republic of China with the signing of the Treaty of Taipei. Japan and the Soviet Union formally made peace four years later, when they signed the Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956.


title: Surrender of Japan

text: Japanese holdouts, especially on small Pacific Islands, refused to surrender at all (believing the declaration to be propaganda or considering surrender against their code). Some may never have heard of it. Teruo Nakamura, the last known holdout, emerged from his hidden retreat in what was now independent Indonesia in December 1974, while two other Japanese soldiers, who had joined Communist guerrillas at the end of the war, fought in southern Thailand until 1991.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Star Trek Into Darkness is a 2013 American science fiction action film directed by J. J. Abrams and written by Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, and Damon Lindelof. It is the 12th installment in the "Star Trek" franchise and the sequel to the 2009 film "Star Trek", as the second in a rebooted film series. It features Chris Pine reprising his role as Captain James T. Kirk, with Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Anton Yelchin, Bruce Greenwood, and Leonard Nimoy reprising their roles from the previous film. Benedict Cumberbatch, Alice Eve, and Peter Weller are also in the film's principal cast. It was Nimoy's last film appearance before his death in 2015. Set in the 23rd century, the film follows Kirk and the crew of USS "Enterprise" as they are sent to the Klingon homeworld seeking a former Starfleet member-turned-terrorist, John Harrison.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: After the release of "Star Trek", Abrams, Burk, Lindelof, Kurtzman, and Orci agreed to produce its sequel. Filming began in January 2012. "Into Darkness"s visual effects were primarily created by Industrial Light & Magic. The film was converted to 3D during its post-production stage. It premiered at Event Cinemas in Sydney, Australia, on April 23, 2013, and was released on May 9 in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Europe and Peru, with other countries following.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: The film opened at IMAX cinemas in the U.S. and Canada on May 16, and in standard-format cinemas the next day. "Into Darkness" was a financial success and received positive reviews from critics. Its gross earnings of over $467 million worldwide have made it the highest-grossing entry in the "Star Trek" franchise. It was nominated for Best Visual Effects at the 86th Academy Awards. It was followed by "Star Trek Beyond" in 2016.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: In 2259, Captain James T. Kirk is removed from command of the starship USS "Enterprise" for violating the Prime Directive after exposing the ship to the primitive inhabitants of the planet Nibiru in order to save them, and Spock, from a cataclysmic volcanic eruption. Admiral Christopher Pike is reinstated as commanding officer with Kirk demoted to first officer. Spock is transferred to another ship. Shortly after, Starfleet officer Thomas Harewood, sent by Commander John Harrison, bombs a Section 31 installation in London. During an emergency meeting on the situation, Harrison uses a ship to ambush and kill Pike and other senior officers, before transporting to Kronos, homeworld of the hostile Klingons.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Admiral Alexander Marcus reinstates Kirk and Spock to "Enterprise" with orders to kill Harrison using a new long range stealth torpedo. Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott objects to allowing untested torpedoes on board without knowing their specifications; when he is overruled, he resigns. Kirk assigns Pavel Chekov to replace Scotty. En route to Kronos, "Enterprise"s warp capabilities become disabled. Kirk leads a team with Spock and Uhura to the planet, where they are ambushed by Klingon patrols. Harrison appears and kills the Klingons. Harrison surrenders when he learns the precise number of torpedoes on board "Enterprise".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Dr. Leonard McCoy and Marcus's daughter, Dr. Carol Marcus, open a torpedo at Harrison's urging, revealing the torpedoes contain cryonically-frozen humans. Harrison is taken to "Enterprise"s brig, where he reveals his true identity as Khan Noonien Singh, a genetically engineered superhuman, awoken by Admiral Marcus from centuries of sleep and forced to develop advanced weapons. Khan reveals that Marcus sabotaged "Enterprise"s warp drive, intending for the Klingons to destroy the ship after it fired on Kronos, sparking war with the Klingon Empire. Khan also gives Kirk a set of coordinates, which Kirk asks Scott to investigate. Scott discovers the coordinates lead to a covert Starfleet facility.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: "Enterprise" is intercepted by a much larger Starfleet warship, USS "Vengeance", commanded by Admiral Marcus. Marcus demands that Kirk deliver Khan, but "Enterprise" flees to Earth to expose him. After "Vengeance" disables "Enterprise" near the Moon, Carol reveals her presence aboard "Enterprise" to stop the attack. Marcus forcibly transports Carol to "Vengeance" before ordering "Enterprise"s destruction. "Vengeance" loses power after being sabotaged by Scott, who infiltrated the ship. With transporters down, Kirk and Khan, with the latter's knowledge of the warship's design, space-jump to "Vengeance". Meanwhile, Spock contacts his future self on New Vulcan, who tells him of and warns that he cannot be trusted. After fighting their way to the bridge, Khan overpowers Kirk, Scott, and Carol, kills Marcus, and takes control of "Vengeance".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Khan demands that Spock return his frozen crew in exchange for the "Enterprise" officers. Spock complies, having had McCoy surreptitiously remove Khan's frozen crew from the torpedoes beforehand. When Khan starts shooting at "Enterprise", Spock detonates the warheads, crippling the ship. With both starships caught in Earth's gravity, they plummet toward the surface. Kirk enters "Enterprise"s radioactive reactor chamber to realign the warp core, sacrificing himself to save the ship.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Khan crashes "Vengeance" into downtown San Francisco in an attempt to destroy Starfleet headquarters, while McCoy discovers that Khan's blood has regenerative properties that may save Kirk. A vengeful Spock pursues Khan through the city and the two engage in hand-to-hand combat. Uhura beams down and stuns Khan. Spock prepares to kill Khan, but Uhura stops him, explaining he is their only chance to save Kirk. Khan's blood revives Kirk and Khan is sealed in his cryogenic pod and stored with his compatriots. One year later, Kirk speaks at "Enterprise"s re-dedication ceremony. The "Enterprise" crew embarks on a five-year exploratory mission.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Additional members of the Enterprise crew include Amanda Foreman as Ensign Brackett, Jay Scully as Lieutenant Chapin, Jonathan Dixon as Ensign Froman, Aisha Hinds as Navigation Officer Darwin, and Joseph Gatt as Science Officer 0718. Deep Roy and Jason Matthew Smith reprise their roles as Keenser and Hendorff from the first film. Anjini Taneja Azhar, Nolan North, and Sean Blakemore also appear in the film, with Azhar as Lucille Harewood, the terminally ill daughter of Thomas Harewood; North portraying a "Vengeance" helmsman; and Blakemore playing a Klingon. Heather Langenkamp portrays Moto, a character she describes as a small role. Meanwhile, Ser'Darius Blain portrays a security lieutenant aboard the "Enterprise".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: In June 2008, it was reported that Paramount Pictures was interested in signing producers of the 2009 "Star Trek" J. J. Abrams, Bryan Burk, Damon Lindelof, Alex Kurtzman, and Roberto Orci for a sequel. In March 2009, it was reported that these five producers had agreed to produce the film, with a script again written by Orci and Kurtzman (with the addition of Lindelof). A preliminary script was said to be completed by Christmas 2009 for a 2011 release. Kurtzman and Orci began writing the script in June 2009, originally intending to split the film into two parts. Leonard Nimoy, the original Spock who plays an older version of the character in the 2009 film, said he would not appear in the film.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/leonard-nimoy-spock-star-trek-2-rob-24600/"></ref> Abrams was reportedly considering William Shatner for the sequel.<ref name="http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Shatner-May-Finally-Get-A-Part-In-Star-Trek-Again-15319.html"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: By 2010, a release date of June 29, 2012, was set,<ref name="http://collider.com/star-trek-sequel-sets-june-29-2012-release-date/13899/"></ref> with Lindelof announcing he had begun working on the script with Kurtzman and Orci.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/star-trek-2-script-damon-lindelof-sandy-66713/"></ref> Pre-production was set for January 2011, although Burk said actual filming would probably begin during the spring or summer.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/star-trek-2-shoot-date-2011-sandy-69165/"></ref> Actor Zachary Quinto later said that these reports were untrue.<ref name="http://www.movieline.com/2010/07/star-trek-2-delayed. php"></ref> Lindelof compared the sequel to "The Dark Knight".<ref name="http://ca.eonline.com/news/star_trek_producer_sequels_gonna_get/196696"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Abrams, Kurtzman, and Orci said that selecting a villain was difficult; according to Abrams, "the universe Roddenberry created is so vast that it's hard to say one particular thing stands out". They also discussed the possibility of Khan Noonien Singh and Klingons.<ref name="http://www.movieweb.com/news/star-trek-2-villains-discussed-by-jj-abrams"></ref> Kurtzman and Lindelof said they had "broken" the story (created an outline); instead of a sequel, it will be a stand-alone film.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/star-trek-2-story-plot-kurtzman-orci-schrad-90106/"></ref> Abrams admitted in December 2010 that there was still no script.<ref name="http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Star-Trek-2-Update-Abrams-Admits-There-s-Still-No-Script-22164.html"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: In January 2011, Abrams said he had not decided whether or not he would direct, since he had not yet seen a script.<ref name="http://collider.com/j-j-abrams-interview-star-trek-2-super-8/69744/"></ref> Paramount Pictures then approached him, asking that the sequel be in 3D.<ref name="http://www.slashfilm.com/paramount-asked-jj-abrams-film-star-trek-2-3d/"></ref> Abrams said that the film would not be shot in 3D, but filmed in 2D and converted during post-production. He was also interested in filming in IMAX: "IMAX is my favorite format; I’m a huge fan." In February, Orci tweeted that he (with Lindelof and Kurtzman) planned to deliver the script in March 2011. Although the script was not finished on schedule, Paramount began financing pre-production;<ref name="http://screenrant.com/star-trek-2-script-production-vic-103490/"></ref> similar circumstances on the next Jack Ryan film meant that Chris Pine would film the "Star Trek" sequel first.<ref name="http://www.slashfilm.com/jack-ryan-reboot-struggling/"></ref> By April, Orci said at WonderCon that the script's first draft had been completed. Abrams told MTV that when he finished his film, "Super 8", he would turn his full attention to the "Trek" sequel.<ref name="http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2011/05/06/star-trek-2-update-jj-abrams-returning-to-star-fleet-once-super-8-wraps/"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Although a script was completed, uncertainty regarding the extent of Abrams's involvement led to the film's being pushed back six months from its scheduled June 2012 release.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/star-trek-2-delayed-jj-abrams-holidays-2012-benk-117172/"></ref> Other factors which precluded the release, ending up pushing it further back were the high budget and overall difficulty of finding actors to fit the roles. In June, Abrams confirmed that his next project would be the sequel, noting that he would rather the film be good than ready by its scheduled release date. Simon Pegg, who played Scotty, said in an interview that he thought filming would begin during the latter part of the year.<ref name="http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Simon-Pegg-Says-It-s-Common-Knowledge-That-Star-Trek-2-Probably-Shoots-This-Fall-25195.html"></ref> Abrams stated he would prioritize the film's story and characters over an early release date.<ref name="http://www.slashfilm.com/jj-abrams-star-trek-2-put-story-characters-release-date/"></ref> In September, Abrams agreed to direct the film, with the cast from the previous film reprising their respective roles for a winter 2012 or summer 2013 release.<ref name="http://screenrant.com/jj-abrams-star-trek-2-official-sandy-131675/"></ref> In October, Orci said that location scouting was underway, and a comic book series (of which Orci would be creative director) would "foreshadow" the film.<ref name="http://www.slashfilm.com/star-trek-2-update-location-scout-underway-comics-foreshadow-film/"></ref> "Into Darkness" was given a revised release date of 2013,<ref name="http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Star-Trek-2-Finally-Rescheduled-2013-Release-Date-27876.html"></ref> and Michael Giacchino confirmed that he would return to write the score.<ref name="http://collider.com/star-trek-sequel-3d-release-date/128436/"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Lindelof said that Khan was considered a character they needed to use at some point, given that "he has such an intense gravity in the "Trek" universe, we likely would have expended more energy NOT putting him in this movie than the other way around." References to "" were eventually added to the script, but Lindelof, Orci, and Kurtzman "were ever wary of the line between 'reimagined homage' and 'direct ripoff'." Orci and Kurtzman said they wanted a film which would work on its own and as a sequel, not using ideas from previous "Star Trek" works simply "because you think people are going to love it". Orci noted that when trying to create the "gigantic imagery" required by a summer blockbuster, Kurtzman suggested a scene where "Enterprise" rose from the ocean. With that as a starting point they (and Lindelof) came up with the cold open in Nibiru, which blended action and comedy and was isolated from the main story in an homage to "Raiders of the Lost Ark".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Actor Benicio del Toro had reportedly been sought as the villain, and had met with Abrams to discuss the role;<ref name="http://filmonic.com/benicio-del-toro-for-star-trek-2-villain"></ref> however, he later bowed out. In 2011, Alice Eve and Peter Weller agreed to their roles.<ref name="http://www.showblitz.com/2011/11/alice-eve-ready-to-beam-up-for-next-installment-of-star-trek. html"></ref> "Doctor Who" actor Noel Clarke agreed to an unknown role, reported to be "a family man with a wife and young daughter". Demián Bichir auditioned for the villain role, but as reported by "Variety" on January 4, 2012, Benedict Cumberbatch was cast.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: "Into Darkness" began principal photography on January 12, 2012, with a scheduled release date of May 16, 2013. Cinematographer Dan Mindel shot the film using a combination of anamorphic 35mm film and 15 perforation IMAX cameras. About 30 minutes of the film is shot in the IMAX format, while some other scenes were also shot on 8 perforation 65mm. "Into Darkness" was released in 3D. On February 24, 2012, images from the set surfaced of Benedict Cumberbatch's character in a fight with Spock.<ref name="http://www.upcomingmovietrailers.org/star-trek-into-darkness-movie-trailers.html"></ref> Edgar Wright directed one shot in the film.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Filming was done on location in Los Angeles, California, and around the area at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore. Additional locations included Paramount Studios in Hollywood, Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City, the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, and the Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills. Some shots were made in Iceland.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Marc Okrand, the developer of the Klingon language, provided the Klingon dialogues with on-set coaching from constructed language experts. The dialogue did not make cohesive sense following editing and so new dialogue was constructed and dubbed during post production.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On September 10, 2012, Paramount confirmed the film's title as "Star Trek Into Darkness". Abrams had indicated that unlike some of the earlier films in the franchise, his second "Star Trek" would not include a number in its title. This decision was made to avoid repeating the sequel numbering which began with "", or making a confusing jump from "Star Trek " to "Star Trek 12". Lindelof addressed the team's struggle to agree on a title: "There have been more conversations about what we're going to call it than went into actually shooting it... There's no word that comes after the colon after "Star Trek" that's cool. Not that "Star Trek: Insurrection" or "First Contact" aren't good titles, it's just that everything that people are turned off about when it comes to "Trek" is represented by the colon". Of the titles proposed, he joked that he preferred "Star Trek: Transformers 4" best because the title is "technically available".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On May 10, 2013, Cho, Pegg, and Eve were interviewed on "The Bob Rivers Show" to promote the film. Rivers asked about the title: "The title "Star Trek Into Darkness" indicates some sort of ominous turn, obviously". Eve suggested that Pegg discuss the theme of terrorism, and Pegg obliged: "I think it's a very current film, and it reflects certain things that are going on in our own heads at the moment; this idea that our enemy might be walking among us, not necessarily on the other side of an ocean, you know. John Harrison, Benedict Cumberbatch's character, is ambiguous, you know? We [the characters in the film] don't know who to support. Sometimes, Kirk, he seems to be acting in exactly the same way as him [Harrison]. They're both motivated by revenge. And the "Into Darkness" in the title is less an idea of this new trend of po-faced, kind of, everything's-got-to-be-a-bit-dour treatments of essentially childish stories. It's more about Kirk's indecision." Cho agreed about the characterization of Captain Kirk: "It's his crisis of leadership."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: The pivotal scene near the end when Kirk enters the reactor chamber serves as a role reversal of a similar pivotal scene in "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Originally conceived as a retelling of "Heart of Darkness" by Joseph Conrad, Kurtzman and Orci defined the main theme of "Into Darkness" as "how far will we go to exact vengeance and justice on an enemy that scares us. How far should we go from our values?" They added that running from personal values is a personal struggle, where "the enemy’s blood is within us; we are the enemy. We must not succumb to it; we are the same."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Composer Michael Giacchino composed the film's incidental music. "Into Darkness" was Giacchino's fourth film collaboration with Abrams, which included "Star Trek" (2009). The film score was recorded at the Sony Scoring Stage in Culver City, California from March 5 to April 3, 2013. Its soundtrack album was released digitally on May 14, 2013, and was made available on May 28 through Varèse Sarabande. The score contains the original "Star Trek" theme by Alexander Courage.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On April 24, 2013, it was announced that British singer Bo Bruce and Irish songwriter Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol had collaborated on a song for the film's soundtrack entitled "The Rage That's In Us All". Australian songwriter and producer Robert Conley co-wrote a track with Penelope Austin, "The Dark Collide".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: As part of a contest Abrams designed after the release of "Super 8" (2011), the prize for answering a series of questions would be walk-on roles for two people in "Into Darkness".<ref name="http://bluray.ign.com/articles/121/1213068p1.html"></ref> He debuted three frames of the film on "Conan" on October 4, 2012, showing what he described as Spock "in a volcano, in this crazy suit". The official poster for the film was released two months later on December 3, 2012, showing a mysterious figure (thought to be Benedict Cumberbatch's villain) standing on a pile of burning rubble looking over what appears to be a damaged London; he is standing in a hole in the shape of the Starfleet insignia, blown out of the side of a building.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: About nine minutes of the opening sequence was shown before IMAX presentations of "", which was released in the United States on December 14, 2012.<ref name="http://movies.msn.com/movies/article.aspx?news=774888&obref=obinsource"></ref> Alice Eve, Cumberbatch, and Burk unveiled the IMAX prologue in London, England on December 14. A two-minute teaser was released in iTunes Movie Trailers on December 17. The teaser marked the beginning of a viral marketing campaign, with a hidden link directing fans to a movie-related website. A 30-second teaser premiered February 3, 2013 during the stadium blackout of Super Bowl XLVII. The same day, Paramount released apps for Android, iPhone, and Windows Phone which enabled users to unlock tickets for showtimes two days before the film's release date.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: An international trailer was released on March 21, 2013, with an embedded URL revealing an online-only international poster. On April 8, Paramount released the final international one-sheet featuring solely Benedict Cumberbatch's character.<ref name="http://trekmovie.com/2013/04/08/new-into-darkness-international-one-sheet-poster-more-details-on-ukireland-tues-tix-sales/"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On April 12, 2013, iTunes Movie Trailers revealed the final domestic one-sheet featuring USS "Enterprise", and announced that the final US domestic trailer would be released on April 16. In the days leading up to the trailer release, character posters featuring Kirk, Spock, Uhura, and Harrison were released on iTunes.<ref name="http://trekmovie.com/2013/04/12/star-trek-into-darkness-domestic-poster-has-arrived-trailer-online-next-tuesday/"></ref>


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Paramount attempted to broaden the film's appeal to international audiences, an area where "Star Trek" and other science-fiction films had generally performed poorly. "Into Darkness" was dedicated to post-9/11 veterans.<ref name="http://trekmovie.com/2013/05/11/star-trek-into-darkness-dedicated-to-post-911-vets-four-vets-from-mission-continues-featured-in-film/"></ref> J.J. Abrams is connected with The Mission Continues, and a section of the film's website is dedicated to that organization.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: The cast (except for Anton Yelchin, Bruce Greenwood, and Peter Weller) participated in May 2013 press junkets. On May 7, Pegg appeared on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!". On May 8, Quinto was interviewed on "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon". He was followed on May 10 by Cumberbatch (who told Fallon that his fans are called "Cumberbitches"; Fallon countered that his are called "FalPals") and on May 17 by Saldana. Saldana said that she lobbied Abrams for four years: "If we make a sequel, Uhura needs to kick ass". On May 9, Cumberbatch appeared on the "Late Show with David Letterman".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On May 10, Cho, Pegg, and Eve had a radio interview on "The Bob Rivers Show". They discussed approaching a body of work already mastered by an earlier generation of actors, agreeing that they would remain with the franchise as long as it lasted. That night, Chris Pine appeared on the "Late Show with David Letterman"; Letterman showed a gag reel of robots in a black-and-white film before showing a clip from "Into Darkness". Pine said that he had to gain weight for the role of Captain Kirk.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: One story told by cast members during the promotion concerned an on-set prank initially devised by Pegg, which he later noted grew out of proportion. While filming at the National Ignition Facility, Pegg and Pine (with the crew's help) tricked the arriving actors into believing there was "ambient radiation" at the location and they had to wear "neutron cream" to avoid being burned by it. Cumberbatch was tricked into signing a release (which was meant to give the joke away, but he signed it without reading it), while Urban and Cho were tricked into recording a public service announcement about the necessity for neutron cream.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On May 13, Abrams appeared on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart", and on May 16, Pine appeared on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show". On May 14, Abrams, Zachary Quinto, Pine, and Alice Eve appeared on "The Urgant Show" (Russian: Вечерний Ургант) in Russia.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Dolby Laboratories and Paramount announced that "Star Trek Into Darkness" would be released in Dolby Atmos, with Andy Nelson and Anna Behlmer handling the mix with supervision from Ben Burtt and Matthew Wood. The film was released on May 9, 2013, in international markets and May 16, 2013, in the United States.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: "Star Trek Into Darkness" was released as a digital download on August 20, 2013. It was first released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D in the United Kingdom on September 2 and in the United States and Canada on September 10. There is also a Special Limited Edition Blu-ray set available with a model on a stand of USS "Vengeance" as seen in this movie.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: In North America, the release is split into various retailer exclusives. Retailer Best Buy has an exclusive Blu-ray edition with 30 minutes of additional content. Target's Blu-ray edition also has 30 minutes of additional content that is different from Best Buy's. Online retailer iTunes' version comes with audio commentary for the film not available in the retailer exclusives. A collection of deleted scenes is available exclusively via the Xbox SmartGlass second-screen app paired with the Xbox Video release of the film.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: The split of the special features between various retailers has attracted criticism from fans. In particular, The Digital Bits' editor Bill Hunt remarked that "taking fully half or more of the disc-based special features created for a major Blu-ray release and casting them to the winds as retailer exclusives, thus forcing your customers to go on an expensive scavenger hunt is, I’m sorry, absolutely outrageous. Seriously, if Paramount is going to treat its Blu-ray customers like this, they should just get out of the business altogether. Or better yet, farm all their titles out to third party licensees who will treat these films and Blu-ray customers in general with greater care and respect." Weeks after posting his article, Hunt himself was invited by Paramount to discuss about the issue of giving away the film's special features to different retail partners. He suggested "[putting] together the true special edition that should have been delivered from the start, with all of the extras that got scattered around to different retailers, including the enhanced audio commentary, plus all-new content just for this release... [and] to consider offering the IMAX version of the film..."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: "Into Darkness" earned $13.5 million on its opening day in the United States and Canada, lower than "Star Trek"'s $30.9 million. The film earned $21.6million the following Friday, also lower than its predecessor's earnings four years earlier ($26million). It earned $70.6million during its opening weekend, finishing in the US box-office top spot (above "The Great Gatsby" and "Iron Man 3"). Total weekend earnings were $84.1million, including the early-showing grosses. Although these were lower than Paramount's projected box-office earnings, studio vice-chairman Rob Moore said he was "extremely pleased" with the sequel's performance.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Several weeks after release, the film grossed $147million at the foreign box office, surpassing the lifetime international earnings of its predecessor. "Into Darkness" reached the top spot of China's box office with a $25.8million gross, tripling the overall earnings of the previous film during its opening weekend. "Star Trek Into Darkness" ended its North American theatrical run on September 12, 2013, with a box office total of $228,778,661, which places it as the 11th highest-grossing film for 2013. It earned $467,365,246 worldwide, ranking it in 14th place for 2013, and making it the highest-grossing film of the franchise.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Scott Mendelson of "Forbes" contends that the film's box office performance was the result of Paramount's inability to sell the basic components of the film's story, and inclusion of Khan "for little reason other than marketability and then spent the next year or so lying to everyone and claiming said villain wasn't in the picture[...] With no added value elements to sell, Paramount was forced to craft a generic campaign based around Benedict Cumberbatch as "Generic Bad Guy", so the excitement never took hold[...] This was adding to the idea that merely withholding basic story elements is tantamount to promising stunning plot twists[...] and it made fans and general moviegoers less excited about "Star Trek 2" than they were four, three, or even two years ago." Calculating in all expenses, "Deadline Hollywood" estimated that the film made a profit of $29.9 million.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 84%, based on 292 reviews, with an average rating of 7.43/10. The site's consensus reads, "Visually spectacular and suitably action packed, "Star Trek Into Darkness" is a rock-solid installment in the venerable sci-fi franchise, even if it's not as fresh as its predecessor." On Metacritic the film has a score of 72 out of 100, based on 43 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Critics called it a "rousing adventure" and "a riveting action-adventure in space". Cumberbatch's performance attracted praise from critics, with Peter Travers of "Rolling Stone" calling it a "tour de force to reckon with" and his character "a villain for the ages". Joe Neumaier of the New York "Daily News" wrote that Cumberbatch delivered "one of the best blockbuster villains in recent memory". Jonathan Romney of "The Independent" noted Cumberbatch's voice, saying it was "so sepulchrally resonant that it could have been synthesised from the combined timbres of Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart, and Alan Rickman holding an elocution contest down a well". "The New York Times" praised his screen presence: "He fuses Byronic charisma with an impatient, imperious intelligence that seems to raise the ambient I.Q. whenever he's on screen".


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: However, not all of the reviews were positive; "The Independent" said the film would "underwhelm even the Trekkies". Lou Lumenick of the "New York Post" gave the film one-and-a-half stars (out of four), saying it had a "limp plot" and the "special effects are surprisingly cheesy for a big-budget event movie". A.O. Scott dismissed the film in "The New York Times": "It's uninspired hackwork, and the frequent appearance of blue lens flares does not make this movie any more of a personal statement". Nicholas Meyer, director of "Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan" (from which the film borrows and remakes some scenes), revealed in 2018 that he had been disappointed with the film. He was quoted as saying: "In my sort of artistic worldview, if you're going to do an homage, you have to add something. You have to put another layer on it, and they didn't. Just by putting the same words in different characters' mouths didn't add up to anything, and if you have someone dying in one scene and sort of being resurrected immediately after, there's no real drama going on. It just becomes a gimmick or gimmicky, and that's what I found it to be, ultimately."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: The film was criticized for a scene with actress Alice Eve's character Carol Marcus in her underwear, which was called "wholly unnecessary" and "gratuitous". Screenwriter and producer Damon Lindelof apologized on Twitter for the scene: "I take responsibility and will be more mindful in the future". On "Conan", Abrams addressed the matter by debuting a deleted scene of actor Benedict Cumberbatch's character Khan taking a shower. Eve addressed the underwear controversy at a 2013 Las Vegas "Star Trek" Convention and said, "I didn't know it would cause such a ruckus. I didn't feel exploited."


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: Despite an acclaimed performance from Cumberbatch, Christian Blauvelt of Hollywood.com criticized the casting of the actor as Khan Noonien Singh, saying that the character had been "whitewashed into oblivion", since Khan is an explicitly non-white character in the "Star Trek" canon (introduced as a Sikh and former ruler of much of eastern Eurasia). There have been similar accusations of whitewashing by fans and American Sikhs, with "" actor Garrett Wang tweeting "The casting of Cumberbatch was a mistake on the part of the producers. I am not being critical of the actor or his talent, just the casting". George Takei, the original Hikaru Sulu, was also disappointed with the casting, as he thought it would have been better to cast Cumberbatch not as an established villain like Khan but as a new character. On Trekmovie.com, co-producer and co-screenwriter Bob Orci addressed Khan's casting: "Basically, as we went through the casting process and we began honing in on the themes of the movie, it became uncomfortable for me to support demonizing anyone of color, particularly any one of Middle Eastern descent or anyone evoking that. One of the points of the movie is that we must be careful about the villain within , not some other race". An in-canon comic book has subsequently been created to retcon Khan's hitherto unexplained change in ethnicity in the film.


title: Star Trek Into Darkness

text: In an interview with Buzzfeed two years after the film's release, Abrams addressed some of the film's shortcomings. He thought that the dynamic for Kirk and Spock's relationship in the film "wasn't really clear." For keeping the identity of Khan a secret prior to the film's release, Abrams felt he "was trying to preserve the fun for the audience, and not just tell them something that the characters don't learn for 45 minutes into the movie, so the audience wouldn't be so ahead of it." In the end, Abrams recognized that "there were certain things I was unsure of[...] Any movie[...] has a fundamental conversation happening during it. And [for "Into Darkness",] I didn't have it[...] [The problems with the plot] was not anyone's fault but mine, or, frankly, anyone's problem but mine. [The script] was a little bit of a collection of scenes that were written by my friends[...] And yet, I found myself frustrated by my choices, and unable to hang my hat on an undeniable thread of the main story. So then I found myself on that movie basically tap-dancing as well as I could to try and make the sequences as entertaining as possible[...] I would never say that I don't think that the movie ended up working. But I feel like it didn't work as well as it could have had I made some better decisions before we started shooting."


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Georgia Totto O'Keeffe (November 15, 1887 – March 6, 1986) was an American modernist artist. She was known for her paintings of enlarged flowers, New York skyscrapers, and New Mexico landscapes. O'Keeffe has been called the "Mother of American modernism".


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1905, O'Keeffe began art training at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and then the Art Students League of New York. In 1908, unable to fund further education, she worked for two years as a commercial illustrator and then taught in Virginia, Texas, and South Carolina between 1911 and 1918. She studied art in the summers between 1912 and 1914 and was introduced to the principles and philosophies of Arthur Wesley Dow, who created works of art based upon personal style, design, and interpretation of subjects, rather than trying to copy or represent them. This caused a major change in the way she felt about and approached art, as seen in the beginning stages of her watercolors from her studies at the University of Virginia and more dramatically in the charcoal drawings that she produced in 1915 that led to total abstraction. Alfred Stieglitz, an art dealer and photographer, held an exhibit of her works in 1917. Over the next couple of years, she taught and continued her studies at the Teachers College, Columbia University.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: She moved to New York in 1918 at Stieglitz's request and began working seriously as an artist. They developed a professional and personal relationship that led to their marriage in 1924. O'Keeffe created many forms of abstract art, including close-ups of flowers, such as the "Red Canna" paintings, that many found to represent vulvas, though O'Keeffe consistently denied that intention. The imputation of the depiction of women's sexuality was also fueled by explicit and sensuous photographs of O'Keeffe that Stieglitz had taken and exhibited.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe and Stieglitz lived together in New York until 1929, when O'Keeffe began spending part of the year in the Southwest, which served as inspiration for her paintings of New Mexico landscapes and images of animal skulls, such as "" and "Ram's Head White Hollyhock and Little Hills." After Stieglitz's death, she lived in New Mexico at Georgia O'Keeffe Home and Studio in Abiquiú until the last years of her life, when she lived in Santa Fe. In 2014, O'Keeffe's 1932 painting "Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1" sold for $44,405,000, more than three times the previous world auction record for any female artist. After her death, the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum was established in Santa Fe.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Georgia O'Keeffe was born on November 15, 1887, in a farmhouse in the town of Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. Her parents, Francis Calyxtus O'Keeffe and Ida (Totto) O'Keeffe, were dairy farmers. Her father was of Irish descent. Her maternal grandfather, George Victor Totto, for whom O'Keeffe was named, was a Hungarian count who came to the United States in 1848.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe was the second of seven children. She attended Town Hall School in Sun Prairie. By age 10, she had decided to become an artist, and with her sisters, Ida and Anita, she received art instruction from local watercolorist Sara Mann. O'Keeffe attended high school at Sacred Heart Academy in Madison, Wisconsin, as a boarder between 1901 and 1902. In late 1902, the O'Keeffes moved from Wisconsin to the close-knit neighborhood of Peacock Hill in Williamsburg, Virginia, where O'Keeffe's father started a business making rusticated cast concrete block in anticipation of a demand for the block in the Peninsula building trade, but the demand never materialized. O'Keeffe stayed in Wisconsin with her aunt attending Madison Central High School until joining her family in Virginia in 1903. She completed high school as a boarder at Chatham Episcopal Institute in Virginia (now Chatham Hall), graduating in 1905. At Chatham, she was a member of Kappa Delta sorority.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe taught and headed the art department at West Texas State Normal College, watching over her youngest sibling, Claudia, at her mother's request. In 1917, she visited her brother, Alexis, at a military camp in Texas before he shipped out for Europe during World War I. While there, she created the painting "The Flag", which expressed her anxiety and depression about the war.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: From 1905 to 1906, O'Keeffe was enrolled at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she studied with John Vanderpoel and ranked at the top of her class. As a result of contracting typhoid fever, she had to take a year off from her education. In 1907, she attended the Art Students League in New York City, where she studied under William Merritt Chase, Kenyon Cox, and F. Luis Mora. In 1908, she won the League's William Merritt Chase still-life prize for her oil painting "Dead Rabbit with Copper Pot". Her prize was a scholarship to attend the League's outdoor summer school in Lake George, New York. While in the New York City, O'Keeffe visited galleries, such as 291, co-owned by her future husband, photographer Alfred Stieglitz. The gallery promoted the work of avant-garde artists and photographers from the United States and Europe.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1908, O'Keeffe discovered that she would not be able to finance her studies. Her father had gone bankrupt and her mother was seriously ill with tuberculosis. She was not interested in a career as a painter based on the mimetic tradition that had formed the basis of her art training. She took a job in Chicago as a commercial artist and worked there until 1910, when she returned to Virginia to recuperate from the measles and later moved with her family to Charlottesville, Virginia. She did not paint for four years and said that the smell of turpentine made her ill. She began teaching art in 1911. One of her positions was at her former school, Chatham Episcopal Institute, in Virginia.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: She took a summer art class in 1912 at the University of Virginia from Alon Bement, who was a Columbia University Teachers College faculty member. Under Bement, she learned of the innovative ideas of Arthur Wesley Dow, Bement's colleague. Dow's approach was influenced by principles of design and composition in Japanese art. She began to experiment with abstract compositions and develop a personal style that veered away from realism. From 1912 to 1914, she taught art in the public schools in Amarillo in the Texas Panhandle, and was a teaching assistant to Bement during the summers. She took classes at the University of Virginia for two more summers. She also took a class in the spring of 1914 at Teachers College of Columbia University with Dow, who further influenced her thinking about the process of making art. Her studies at the University of Virginia, based upon Dow's principles, were pivotal in O'Keeffe's development as an artist. Through her exploration and growth as an artist, she helped to establish the American modernism movement.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: She taught at Columbia College in Columbia, South Carolina in late 1915, where she completed a series of highly innovative charcoal abstractions based on her personal sensations. In early 1916, O'Keeffe was in New York at Teachers College, Columbia University. She mailed the charcoal drawings to a friend and former classmate at Teachers College, Anita Pollitzer, who took them to Alfred Stieglitz at his 291 gallery early in 1916. Stieglitz found them to be the "purest, finest, sincerest things that had entered 291 in a long while", and said that he would like to show them. In April that year, Stieglitz exhibited ten of her drawings at 291.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: After further course work at Columbia in early 1916 and summer teaching for Bement, she became the chair of the art department at West Texas State Normal College, in Canyon, Texas beginning in the fall of 1916. She began a series of watercolor paintings based upon the scenery and expansive views during her walks, including vibrant paintings of Palo Duro Canyon. O'Keeffe, who enjoyed sunrises and sunsets, developed a fondness for intense and nocturnal colors. Building upon a practice she began in South Carolina, O'Keeffe painted to express her most private sensations and feelings. Rather than sketching out a design before painting, she freely created designs. O'Keeffe continued to experiment until she believed she truly captured her feelings in the watercolor, "Light Coming on the Plains No. I" (1917). She "captured a monumental landscape in this simple configuration, fusing blue and green pigments in almost indistinct tonal graduations that simulate the pulsating effect of light on the horizon of the Texas Panhandle," according to author Sharyn Rohlfsen Udall. After her relationship with Alfred Stieglitz started, her watercolor paintings ended quickly. Stieglitz heavily encouraged her to quit because the use of watercolor was associated with amateur women artists.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Stieglitz, 24 years older than O'Keeffe, provided financial support and arranged for a residence and place for her to paint in New York in 1918. They developed a close personal relationship while he promoted her work. She came to know the many early American modernists who were part of Stieglitz's circle of artists, including painters Charles Demuth, Arthur Dove, Marsden Hartley, John Marin, and photographers Paul Strand and Edward Steichen. Strand's photography, as well as that of Stieglitz and his many photographer friends, inspired O'Keeffe's work. Also around this time, O'Keeffe became sick during the 1918 flu pandemic.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe began creating simplified images of natural things, such as leaves, flowers, and rocks. Inspired by Precisionism, "The Green Apple", completed in 1922, depicts her notion of simple, meaningful life. O'Keeffe said that year, "it is only by selection, by elimination, and by emphasis that we get at the real meaning of things." "Blue and Green Music" expresses O'Keeffe's feelings about music through visual art, using bold and subtle colors.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Also in 1922, journalist Paul Rosenfeld commented "[the] Essence of very womanhood permeates her pictures", citing her use of color and shapes as metaphors for the female body. This same article also describes her paintings in a sexual manner.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe, most famous for her depiction of flowers, made about 200 flower paintings, which by the mid-1920s were large-scale depictions of flowers, as if seen through a magnifying lens, such as "Oriental Poppies" and several "Red Canna" paintings. She painted her first large-scale flower painting, "Petunia, No. 2", in 1924 and it was first exhibited in 1925. Making magnified depictions of objects created a sense of awe and emotional intensity. On November 20, 2014, O'Keeffe's "Jimson Weed/White Flower No 1" (1932) sold for $44,405,000 in 2014 at auction to Walmart heiress Alice Walton, more than three times the previous world auction record for any female artist.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Art historian Linda Nochlin interpreted "Black Iris III" (1926) as a morphological metaphor for a vulva, but O'Keeffe rejected that interpretation, claiming they were just pictures of flowers.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: After having moved into a 30th floor apartment in the Shelton Hotel in 1925, O'Keeffe began a series of paintings of the city skyscrapers and skyline. One of her most notable works, which demonstrates her skill at depicting the buildings in the Precisionist style, is the "Radiator BuildingNight, New York". Other examples are "New York Street with Moon" (1925), "The Shelton with Sunspots, N.Y." (1926), and "City Night" (1926). She made a cityscape, "East River from the Thirtieth Story of the Shelton Hotel" in 1928, a painting of her view of the East River and smoke-emitting factories in Queens. The next year she made her final New York City skyline and skyscraper paintings and traveled to New Mexico, which became a source of inspiration for her work.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1924, Stieglitz arranged a simultaneous exhibit of O'Keeffe's works of art and his photographs at Anderson Galleries and arranged for other major exhibits. The Brooklyn Museum held a retrospective of her work in 1927. In 1928, Stieglitz announced that six of her calla lily paintings sold to an anonymous buyer in France for US$25,000, but there is no evidence that this transaction occurred the way Stieglitz reported. As a result of the press attention, O'Keeffe's paintings sold at a higher price from that point onward. By the late 1920s she was noted for her work depicting American subjects, particularly for the paintings of New York city skyscrapers and close-up paintings of flowers.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe traveled to New Mexico by 1929 with her friend Rebecca Strand and stayed in Taos with Mabel Dodge Luhan, who provided the women with studios. From her room she had a clear view of the Taos Mountains as well as the morada (meetinghouse) of the "Hermanos de la Fraternidad Piadosa de Nuestro Padre Jesús Nazareno" aka the Penitentes. O'Keeffe went on many pack trips, exploring the rugged mountains and deserts of the region that summer and later visited the nearby D. H. Lawrence Ranch, where she completed her now famous oil painting, "The Lawrence Tree", currently owned by the Wadsworth Athenaeum in Hartford, Connecticut. O'Keeffe visited and painted the nearby historical San Francisco de Asis Mission Church at Ranchos de Taos. She made several paintings of the church, as had many artists, and her painting of a fragment of it silhouetted against the sky captured it from a unique perspective.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe then spent part of nearly every year working in New Mexico. She collected rocks and bones from the desert floor and made them and the distinctive architectural and landscape forms of the area subjects in her work. Known as a loner, O'Keeffe often explored the land she loved in her Ford Model A, which she purchased and learned to drive in 1929. She often talked about her fondness for Ghost Ranch and Northern New Mexico, as in 1943, when she explained, "Such a beautiful, untouched lonely feeling place, such a fine part of what I call the 'Faraway'. It is a place I have painted before ... even now I must do it again."


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe did not work from late 1932 until about the mid-1930s as she endured various nervous breakdowns and was admitted to a psychiatric hospital. These nervous breakdowns were the result of O'Keeffe learning of her husband's affair. She was a popular artist, receiving commissions while her works were being exhibited in New York and other places. In 1936, she completed what would become one of her best-known paintings, "Summer Days". It depicts a desert scene with a deer skull with vibrant wildflowers. Resembling "Ram's Head with Hollyhock", it depicted the skull floating above the horizon.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1938, the advertising agency N. W. Ayer & Son approached O'Keeffe about creating two paintings for the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (now Dole Food Company) to use in advertising. Other artists who produced paintings of Hawaii for the Hawaiian Pineapple Company's advertising include Lloyd Sexton, Jr., Millard Sheets, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Isamu Noguchi, and Miguel Covarrubias. The offer came at a critical time in O'Keeffe's life: she was 51, and her career seemed to be stalling (critics were calling her focus on New Mexico limited, and branding her desert images "a kind of mass production"). She arrived in Honolulu February 8, 1939, aboard the SS "Lurline" and spent nine weeks in Oahu, Maui, Kauai, and the island of Hawaii. By far the most productive and vivid period was on Maui, where she was given complete freedom to explore and paint. She painted flowers, landscapes, and traditional Hawaiian fishhooks. Back in New York, O'Keeffe completed a series of 20 sensual, verdant paintings. However, she did not paint the requested pineapple until the Hawaiian Pineapple Company sent a plant to her New York studio.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: During the 1940s, O'Keeffe had two one-woman retrospectives, the first at the Art Institute of Chicago (1943). Her second was in 1946, when she was the first woman artist to have a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in Manhattan. Whitney Museum of American Art began an effort to create the first catalogue of her work in the mid-1940s.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In the 1940s, O'Keeffe made an extensive series of paintings of what is called the "Black Place", about west of her Ghost Ranch house. O'Keeffe said that the Black Place resembled "a mile of elephants with gray hills and white sand at their feet." She made paintings of the "White Place", a white rock formation located near her Abiquiú house.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1946, she began making the architectural forms of her Abiquiú house—patio wall and door—subjects in her work. Another distinctive painting was "Ladder to the Moon", 1958. O'Keeffe produced a series of cloudscape art, such as "Sky above the Clouds" in the mid-1960s that were inspired by her views from airplane windows.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Worcester Art Museum held a retrospective of her work in 1960 and ten years later, the Whitney Museum of American Art mounted the "Georgia O'Keeffe Retrospective Exhibition".


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1972, O'Keeffe lost much of her eyesight due to macular degeneration, leaving her with only peripheral vision. She stopped oil painting without assistance in 1972. In the 1970s, she made a series of works in watercolor. Her autobiography, "Georgia O'Keeffe", published in 1976 was a best seller.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Judy Chicago gave O'Keeffe a prominent place in her "The Dinner Party" (1979) in recognition of what many prominent feminist artists considered groundbreaking introduction of sensual and feminist imagery in her works of art. Although feminists celebrated O'Keeffe as the originator of "female iconography", O'Keeffe refused to join the feminist art movement or cooperate with any all-women projects. She disliked being called a "woman artist" and wanted to be considered an "artist."


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe's lotus paintings may have deeper ties to vulvar imagery and symbolism. In Egyptian mythology, lotus flowers are a symbol of the womb, and in Indian mythology, they are direct symbols for vulvas.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: Art dealer Samuel Kootz was one of O'Keeffe's critics who, although considering her to be "the only prominent woman artist" (in the words of Marilyn Hall Mitchell), considered sexual expression in her work (and other artists' work) artistically problematic. Kootz stated that "assertion of sex can only impede the talents of an artist, for it is an act of defiance, of grievance, in which the consciousness of these qualities retards the natural assertions of the painter".


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: O'Keeffe stood her ground against sexual interpretations of her work, and for fifty years maintained that there was no connection between vulvas and her artwork. Firing back against some of the criticism, O'Keeffe stated, “When people read erotic symbols into my paintings, they’re really talking about their own affairs.” She attributed other artists' attacks on her work to psychological projection. O'Keeffe was also seen as a revolutionary feminist; however, the artist rejected these notions, stating that "femaleness is irrelevant" and that “it has nothing to do with art making or accomplishment.”


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1938, O'Keeffe received an honorary degree of "Doctor of Fine Arts" from The College of William & Mary. Later, O'Keeffe was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters and in 1966 was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among her awards and honors, O'Keeffe received the M. Carey Thomas Award at Bryn Mawr College in 1971 and two years later received an honorary degree from Harvard University.


title: Georgia O'Keeffe

text: In 1977, President Gerald Ford presented O'Keeffe with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor awarded to American civilians. In 1985, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Ronald Reagan. In 1993, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.