Lush colors evoke the power of life in this vivid painting by important 20th century artist Sakakibara Shiro enclosed in the original signed box titled Shushoku (Autumn Color) dated Autumn of Taisho 7 (1918). It is mounted in an extravagant brocade border with ivory rollers (the rollers will be changed if exporting). It is 57 x 134 cm (22-1/2 57 inches). There are a couple of bubbles in the silk where it has come un-adhered, and faint foxing.
Sakakibara Shiho (1887 – 1971) was born in Kyoto and studied traditional Japanese painting at the Kyoto City School of Arts and Crafts, graduating in 1907, then moved on to the Kyoto Municipal School of Painting (mod University of Art). While at the school, his works were accepted (1909) and awarded (1911) into the Bunten National Exhibition. He graduated there in 1913. With his radical style garnering disapproval in official circles, in 1918, along with Tsuchida Bakusen, Irie Hakko, Ono Chikkyo and Murakami Kagaku founded the Kokuga Sosaku Kyokai. The organization changed its name to the Kokugakai in 1928, the same year Shiho took a position at his alma mater where he was awarded a professorship in 1937. He was awarded for his life’s work by the Nihon Geijutsu-in (Japan Art Academy) in 1962. Happily, the Kokuga-kai has outlived its founders, and is still exhibiting annually to this day. Works are held in the collections of the Seattle Art Museum, The Kyoto National Museum of Modern Art, the Adachi Museum as well as the Otani memorial Art Museum among others.
