Shohaku Art Museum
This exhibition explores the world of contemporary Japanese artist Atsushi Uemura, whose work explores the delicate details found within the natural world. A painter of Nihonga (a modern term to denote painting using Japanese traditional pigments and techniques), Uemura is considered a master of kacho-ga paintings of flowers and birds. He is inspired by the many birds he grew up with and continues to raise in his studio in Nara. The exhibit comprises Uemura’s work over a career spanning more than 60 years. Uemura was born into a family of Kyoto painters in 1933: his late grandmother was famed artist Shoen Uemura, known for her innovative portraits of women at the turn of the century, while his father, Shoko Uemura, was also a celebrated painter. Atsushi Uemura is the director of the Shohaku Museum, whose permanent collection is made up of his and his family’s artwork.
Image: “First Winter” by Atsushi Uemura, 1993.