Sugawara Mitsuru
1936 (Shōwa 11)
Sugawara Mitsuru (1911-1947) was born in Shitadaicho, Sakata Town (modern 2-chome, Hiyoshicho, Sakata City). Graduated from Yamagata Prefectural Sakata Girls High School (modern Yamagata Prefectural Sakata Nishi Senior High School). In 1932, she graduated from the regular program of the Western painting department of the instructor’s faculty at the Private Women’s School of Fine Arts (now the Joshibi University of Art and Design), and as a Shōnai-originating woman pioneer of Western art, she engaged in full-fledged artistic production. In 1945, the last year of World War II, she evacuated to her husband’s childhood home (Ōi household) in Yutagawa, Tsuruoka City. The following year she came down with an illness, passing away with her ambitions left unfulfilled.