Ohara Shōson
Japanese, 1877-1945
Water Lily, after 1926
Gift of Paul Schweitzer P.77.28.57

Prints of Birds and Flowers by Ohara Shōson (1877-1945)

Saturday, February 27, 2010—Sunday, June 20, 2010
Louis W. Hill Jr. Gallery of Japanese Prints (239)
Free Exhibition

Ohara Shōson was initially trained as a painter in the naturalistic style of the Shijō School with Suzuki Kason (1860-1919). While teaching at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts, the first Japanese academy of fine arts, he met Earnest Fenollosa (1853-1908), an American philosopher and art historian who helped found the academy. In the midst of the Japan's transformation into a modern industrial country, Fenollosa saw the need for preserving traditional Japanese art. With Fenollosa's encouragement, Shōson started designing woodblock prints, which were sold mainly in the United States. During the 1910s and 1920s, in collaboration with the famous print publisher Watanabe Shōzaburō, Shōson produced a number of commercial prints, which were marketed in Europe as well as in the U.S. The majority of his prints were kachō-ga--depictions of birds, flowers and small animals--in traditional Japanese style. Ever popular in the U.S., Shōson's prints have only recently been rediscovered in Japan, where they are presently gaining in popularity among print collectors.