Yorozu Tetsugorō
Year Unknown
Oil on Canvas
From Mr. I’s Collection
Yorozu Tetsugorō
1885-1927
Born in Iwate Prefecture. Yorozu studied Japanese painting in his earlier years, then expanded to Western-style art with watercolors. He moved to Tokyo in 1903 and studied at the Hakuba-kai (White Horse Society) institute. In 1907 he entered the Tokyo School of Fine Arts and also exhibited at the Hakuba-kai Exhibition. His graduation work, “Naked body, naked women”, is known as a pioneering work of Fauvism in Japan. In 1917 at the Nika Exhibition, he exhibited a cubist-style work which garnered favorable response. He participated in the foundation of the Shunyokai in 1923. He devoted himself to the study of Nanga (southern painting, heavily taking inspiration from Chinese literati painting). He took an independent stance as took the style of beauty he learned from the West, and strove to establish it as a spiritual activity in the climate of Japan.