Apr. 17(Sat), 2021 – Mar. 30(Wed), 2022

Exhibition room 2

Kuroda Seiki (1866-1924) is considered the doyen of Japanese Western-style painting. He acquired his oil painting skills in France as a student of Academic painter Raphaël Collin (1850-1916). It is assumed that Kuroda, on a second visit to France in 1900, saw his former teacher’s painting The Sleeping and was powerfully impressed by its nude image. The composition of Kuroda’s The Fields, painted after his return to Japan, is very similar to that of The Sleeping.

The Sleeping was regarded an important influence on Kuroda’s painting, but it had not been seen for many years because its location was unknown. Recently discovered in Paris, Collin’s painting will be shown for the first time in 120 years. Moreover, the placement of Kuroda’s The Fields side by side with Collin’s The Sleeping, the painting that inspired it, reveals Kuroda’s originality in creating his groundbreaking work of Japanese nude expression.