Oda Kazuma: Catching Whitebait at Nakaumi, Izumo 出雲中海白魚採り (SOLD)

Artist: Oda Kazuma 1882-1956
Title: Catching Whitebait at Nakaumi, Izumo 出雲中海白魚採り Date: 1924

Series: Views of Osaka (Osaka Fukei) 大阪風景

Rhapsody in blue, this dreamlike nocturne has echoes of Van Gogh in the treatment of the fisherman as well as the way the lights reflect on the water as if painted with a brush. A crescent moon and three stars hang in the sky, while the lights to attract fish blaze in in regular intervals along the periphery of the lake. Printed by Watanabe artisans in a manner unlike that of other artists in the famous publisher’s circle, this work is considered a masterpiece of shin hanga. Oda Kazuma is best known as a sosaku-hanga artist; and was one of the founding members of Nippon sosaku hanga kyoka (Society of Japanese createive prints) in 1918. The artist’ was also most prolific in producing lithographic prints, and his lithographs were even included in the 1930 Toledo Museum of Art exhibition. In the early 1920s, however, Kazuma collaborated with Watanabe Shozaburo on six designs that were in the shin hanga tradition, with professional carvers and printers bringing his designs to life.

In the 1930 Toledo Museum catalog, it is noted that this work was published in an edition of 200 prints. This would not be surprising, as this sought-after design rarely appears on the market.

Condition: Excellent impression and color. Very good/excellent condition. Tape stains upper verso and and upper corners and a few very minor stains on margins. Dimensions: 26.6 x 39 cm Signed: Kazuma hitsu

References: Dorothy Blair, Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints, Toledo Museum of Art, 1930 (1997 reprint), no. 168; Amy Reigle Stephens, gen. ed., The New Wave: Twentieth-Century Japanese Prints from the Robert O. Muller Collection, 1993, p. 136, no. 143 (and artist's biography); Kendall H. Brown & Hollis Goodall-Cristante, Shin-Hanga: New Prints in Modern Japan, 1996, p. 29, fig. 19; Nihon no hanga III 1921-1930, Toshi to onna to hikari to kage to (Japanese Prints III, 1921-1930: Cities and Women, Light and Shadows), Chiba City Museum of Art, 2001, p. 41, no. 22; Amanda T. Zehnder, Modern Japanese Prints: The Twentieth Century, Carnegie Museum of Art, 2009, p. 136; Carolyn M. Putney, et. al., Fresh Impressions: Early Modern Japanese Prints, Toledo Museum of Art, 2013, p. 208, cat. no. 175; Chris Uhlenback, Jim Dwinger, Philo Ouweleen, Shin Hanga: The New Prints of Japan 1900-1960, 2022, p. 172, cat. 153.; Art Institute of Chicago, Bruce Goff Archive, gift of Shin'enkan, inc., reference no. 1990.607.223; Carnegie Museum of Art, item no. DP-510451-22; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Felix Juda Collection, no. M.73.37.466.

SKU: OKZ014