Mori Shumei
Tea Plantation, 1920s-1930s
Hanging scroll; ink and mineral pigments on silk
Overall size 93¼ x 38 in. (237 x 97 cm)
Image size 64¾ x 31¼ in. (164.5 x 79.5 cm)
Image size 64¾ x 31¼ in. (164.5 x 79.5 cm)
T-4770
Signed at lower right Shumei saku (Made by Shumei); sealed Shumei Comes with a wood storage box Mori Shumei was born in Fushimi, Kyoto, in 1892. He graduated from Kyoto...
Signed at lower right Shumei saku (Made by Shumei); sealed Shumei
Comes with a wood storage box
Mori Shumei was born in Fushimi, Kyoto, in 1892. He graduated from Kyoto Municipal School of Crafts in 1910 and was awarded a higher degree from the same institution—under its new name of Kyoto Municipal Specialist Painting School—in 1923, later serving there first as instructor (1926) and then as full professor (1940). He was also active as an instructor at the Seikōsha painting academy, founded by his teacher Nishiyama Suishō (1879-1958). In 1922, Shumei was admitted for the first time to the Teiten national exhibition and would continue to show his work at the Teiten and its successor exhibitions on a further sixteen occasions, finishing in 1944, having achieved the status of suisen (nominated artist) in 1930. He was also selected for the prestigious Shōtoku Taishi Commemorative Exhibition, held in 1928.
Better known for historical subjects and bird, flower, and animal compositions, here Shumei has created an idealized vision of a tea plantation, perhaps one of those in Shizuoka Prefecture below Mount Fuji, with rows of bushes marching in orderly rows toward a hilltop farmhouse surrounded by trees—motifs well suited to the rich green mineral pigments beloved of artists painting in the Nihonga style of neo-nativist painting that was reaching its zenith during the 1920s and 1930s.
Comes with a wood storage box
Mori Shumei was born in Fushimi, Kyoto, in 1892. He graduated from Kyoto Municipal School of Crafts in 1910 and was awarded a higher degree from the same institution—under its new name of Kyoto Municipal Specialist Painting School—in 1923, later serving there first as instructor (1926) and then as full professor (1940). He was also active as an instructor at the Seikōsha painting academy, founded by his teacher Nishiyama Suishō (1879-1958). In 1922, Shumei was admitted for the first time to the Teiten national exhibition and would continue to show his work at the Teiten and its successor exhibitions on a further sixteen occasions, finishing in 1944, having achieved the status of suisen (nominated artist) in 1930. He was also selected for the prestigious Shōtoku Taishi Commemorative Exhibition, held in 1928.
Better known for historical subjects and bird, flower, and animal compositions, here Shumei has created an idealized vision of a tea plantation, perhaps one of those in Shizuoka Prefecture below Mount Fuji, with rows of bushes marching in orderly rows toward a hilltop farmhouse surrounded by trees—motifs well suited to the rich green mineral pigments beloved of artists painting in the Nihonga style of neo-nativist painting that was reaching its zenith during the 1920s and 1930s.