Somiya Ichinen
Year Unknown
Watercolor
From Mr. I’s Collection
Somiya Ichinen
1893-1994
Born in Tokyo. Somiya exhibited in the Kōfūkai and Bunten Exhibitions while studying at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. After graduating, he studied under Fujishima Takeji and Yamashita Shintarō. Nakamura Tsune was an older-brother figure in Somiya’s life. Somiya was awarded the Chogyu Prize at the Nika Exhibition in 1925, and sometime after became a member of the Nika Art Association. In 1934, he moved to the Association of Independent Artists and became a member of the Kokugakai. He was a judge of the Japan Fine Arts Exhibition but later, he became unaffiliated. He was praised for his landscape paintings which captured ever-changing nature from a unique perspective. In his later years, he focused on literature instead of painting due to a visual impairment.