Saburō Hasegawa

Hasegawa Saburō

composition

Saburō Hasegawa ( Japanese 長谷川 三郎 , Hasegawa Saburō ; September 6, 1906 in Chōfu (today: Shimonoseki ), Yamaguchi Prefecture - March 11, 1957 ) was a Japanese painter of the Yōga direction and an early representative of abstract art in Japan.

life and work

Hasegawa was born in Chofu, but grew up in Kobe and attended the "High School for Boys, Konan" there. In 1926 he graduated from Tōkyo Bijutsu Gakkō (now Gedai ) in the subjects of history of aesthetics with a thesis on sesshū and in the fine arts. During this time he had also studied under Koide Narashige in Osaka.

From 1929 to 1932 he was abroad, initially in the USA, then lived for a long time in Paris. He exhibited at the Salon d'Automne and made facsimiles of Italian Renaissance art . During this time he was particularly impressed by Kandinski and Mondrian .

After his return he founded a group committed to modernity together with Murai Masanari . In 1937 he was involved in founding the "Association of Free Artists" ( 自由 美術 家 協会 , Jiyū bijutsuka kyōkai ). In the first exhibition he showed the work "Butterfly Traces " ( 蝶 の 軌跡 , Chō no kiseki ), a representative work of Japanese abstract painting before the Second World War.

In 1950 he befriended the sculptor Isamu Noguchi , who inspired him to do woodcuts and rubbings. In 1955 there was a solo exhibition in the USA, and in the same year Hasegawa became a visiting professor at the California College of the Arts , where he lectured on the history of the arts in the Far East and on Zen . He died in San Francisco in 1957.

Hasegawa's work shows, in addition to the influences of European abstract art, the influence of abstract Zen ink painting, which deals with circles, squares and triangles.

Hasegawa left a number of writings:

• Abstract Art ( ア ブ ス ト ラ ク ト ア ー ト , Abusutorakuto Āto , "Abstract Art"; 1937)
• Atarashii eo miru tebiki ( 新 し い 絵 を 見 る 手 引 き , "Handbook for Viewing New Painting"; 1948)
• Modigliani (モ ジ リ ア ニ , Mojiriani ; 1949)
• Gendai bijutsu ( 現代 美術 , "Contemporary Art"; 1952)

photos

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  Butterfly tracks, 1937

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  Self-portrait, 1951

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  Impromtu, 1952

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  Nature, 1953

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  Happiness like water, 1954

Remarks

1. ↑ This school honors Hasegawa as an important graduate student.

literature

• Japan Foundation (Ed.): Japanese Painting in the Western Style, 19th and 20th Centuries. Exhibition catalog, Cologne, 1985.
• Tazawa Yutaka: Biographical Dictionary of Japanese Art . Kodansha International, 1981. ISBN 0-87011-488-3 .
• Laurance P. Roberts: 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 Hasegawa is the family name, Saburō the first name.