Fukuda Heihachirō

Memorial stone at Fukuda's birthplace

Fukuda Heihachirō ( Japanese 福田 平 八郎 ; born February 28, 1892 in Ōita Prefecture ; died March 22, 1974 ) was a Japanese painter in the western Nihonga style of the Shōwa period .

life and work

Fukuda attended the preparatory course at the Municipal School for Arts and Crafts in Kyōto ( 京都 市立 美術 工 芸 専 門 学校 , Kyōto shiritsu bijutsu kōgei semmon gakkō ) and then graduated from the Municipal School of Painting ( 京都 市立 絵 画 専 学校 学校 , Kyōto shiritsu semmon gakkō ). One of his pictures was already for the annual state art exhibition in 1919, which was abbreviated to "Teiten" from the year. After his contributions had been particularly appreciated at the third and fourth exhibitions, his pictures were admitted without a jury from then on. From 1924 he was a frequent member of the jury himself.

In 1947 Fukuda became a member of the Academy of Fine Arts , and in 1949 he received the first Great Art Prize awarded by the Mainichi Shimbun newspaper . In 1961 he received the Order of Culture .

Fukuda began with a painterly realism of the Maruyama Shijō school , then switched to a decorative style mixed with slightly abstract features. After 1945 his pictures show oriental symbolism, whereby the decorative note was retained. His later works simply show forms with a feeling for expressive coloring. His representative works include

• "Pomegranate tree" ( 安 石榴 , Zakuro ; 1920), on whose branch a cat rests,
• "Carp" ( 鯉 , Koi ), a motif that Fukuda often painted,
• "Rippeln auf dem Wasser" ( 漣 , Sazanami ; 1932), a two-part screen with almost abstract horizontal blue ripples,
• " Ayu " ( 鮎 , Ayu ), a group of these small fish, a motif that Fukuda often painted,
• " Fresh snow" ( 親 雪 , Shinsetsu ) shows almost abstractly only five snow-covered stone slabs,
• "Bamboo shoots" ( 筍 , Takenoko ; 1947), a motif that Fukuda often painted,
• "Rain" ( 雨 , Ame ; 1953). "Rain" shows a gray-blue tile roof section on which you can feel the rain rather than see it.

In 2012, the Japanese Post issued an 80-yen stamp as part of the series "60 Years of the National Museum of Modern Art Tokyo and 50 Years of the National Museum of Modern Art Kyoto ", which included Fukuda's painting "Flowers, a Study" ( 花 の習作 , Hana no shūsaku ) from 1960.

Remarks

1. ↑ Teiten ( 帝 展 ) was the usual short form for Teikoku bijutsu tenrankai ( 帝国 美術展 覧 会 ).

literature

• National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (ed.): Fukuda Heihachirō . In: Kyoto no Nihonga 1910–1930. Kyoto 1986, ISBN 4-87642-117-X .
• Tazawa, Yutaka: Fukuda Heihachirō . In: Biographical Dictionary of Japanese Art. Kodansha International, 1981. ISBN 0-87011-488-3 .
• Laurance P. Roberts: Fukuda Heihachirō . In: A Dictionary of Japanese Artists. Weatherhill, 1976. ISBN 0-8348-0113-2 .

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Fukuda is the family name, Heihachirō the first name.