was a Japanese painter in the

yōga is a style of artistic painting in Japan, typically of Japanese subjects, themes, or landscapes, but using Western (European) artistic conventions, techniques, and materials. The term was coined in the Meiji period (1868–1912) to distingui ...

style.

Life and work

His father was a member of the

samurai The samurai () were members of the warrior class in Japan. They were originally provincial warriors who came from wealthy landowning families who could afford to train their men to be mounted archers. In the 8th century AD, the imperial court d ...

class. In 1872, his family moved to Tokyo. At the age of barely ten, he was already creating Western-style paintings. In 1876, he was enrolled at the new Technical Fine Arts School ((now the

Tokyo Institute of Technology The Tokyo Institute of Technology () was a public university in Meguro, Tokyo, Japan. It merged with Tokyo Medical and Dental University to form the Institute of Science Tokyo on 1 October 2024. The Tokyo Institute of Technology was a De ...

), operated by the Ministry of Industry, where he studied for two years under the Italian artist,

Antonio Fontanesi Antonio Fontanesi (23 February 1818 – 17 April 1882) was an Italian painter who lived in Meiji period Japan between 1876 and 1878. He introduced European oil painting techniques to Japan, and exerted a significant role in the development of mo ...

. When Fontanesi returned to Italy in 1878, he and several other students including

Asai Chū was a Japanese painter, noted for his pioneering work in developing the ''yōga'' (Western-style) art movement in late 19th century and early twentieth-century Japanese painting. Biography Asai was born to an ex-samurai class household in Sak ...

, were unhappy with his replacement and left the school to create their own group, the "Association of the Eleventh" (十一次会), so called because that was the eleventh year of the Meiji era. It was Japan's first modern art association. In 1880, he went to Italy to continue his education. He initially worked with

Cesare Maccari Cesare Maccari (; 9 May 1840 – 7 August 1919) was an Italian painter and sculptor, most famous for his 1888 painting ''Cicerone denuncia Catilina'' (usually translated as ''Cicero Accuses Catiline'' or ''Cicero Denounces Catiline''). Early li ...

then, in 1881, entered a free school associated with the

Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma The Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma is a public tertiary academy of art in Rome, Italy. It was founded in the sixteenth century, but the present institution dates from the time of the unification of Italy and the capture of Rome by the Kingdom ...

. Two years later, he was granted admission to the school itself. He graduated there in 1887. Before returning to Japan, he spent some time in Paris. Once there, he and his old associate, Asai Chū (and others) established the ). After that, he devoted himself almost exclusively to training young artists; teaching at several institutions, including the

Imperial Japanese Army Academy The was the principal officer's training school for the Imperial Japanese Army. The programme consisted of a junior course for graduates of local army cadet schools and for those who had completed four years of middle school, and a senior course f ...

, the Faculty of Architecture at

Tokyo University The University of Tokyo (, abbreviated as in Japanese and UTokyo in English) is a public research university in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1877 as the nation's first modern university by the merger of several pre-westernisation era ins ...

as well as at the Meiji Association school. In 1921, he was named President of the , the precursor to the

Tokyo University of the Arts or is a school of art and music in Japan. Located in Ueno Park, it also has facilities in Toride, Ibaraki, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Kitasenju and Adachi, Tokyo. The university has trained artists in the fields of painting, sculpture, crafts, inter ...

. He also served as a juror at several state exhibitions, notably the . After 1935, he turned to creating large scale historical paintings.

Sources

* Japan Foundation: "Matsuoka". In: ' (exhibition catalog), Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst, Cologne, 1985. * Tazawa, Yutaka: "Matsuoka Hisashi". In: ''Biographical Dictionary of Japanese Art''. Kodansha International, 1981. . * Laurance P. Roberts: "Matsuoka Hisashi". In: ''A Dictionary of Japanese Artists''. Weatherhill, 1976. .

External links

{{Authority control 1862 births 1944 deaths Japanese painters Yōga painters Artists from Okayama Prefecture