Komuro Suiun


Komuro Suiun is the pseudonym of a Japanese nihonga painter who worked mainly in the nanga style, active from the Meiji period to the Shōwa period.

Biography

Suiun was born in the town of Yagoechō, present-day Tatebayashi, in Gunma prefecture. His birth name was Komuro Teijirō. From 1890 until 1898, Suiun studied in the atelier of painter :ja:田崎草雲|Tazaki Sōun 田崎草雲 in Ashikaga, Tochigi prefecture. After Suiun had been Sōun's student for about three years, he was given the name Suiun.
In September 1899, Suiun moved to Tokyo, where he became active in the Tokyo Nanga Association and Japan Art Association. In 1905, his entry to exhibition of the Japan Art Association, Noble Character, Pure Moon was awarded Second Prize, and he was made a committee member of the group. His 1907 entry Tall Trees and Rocky Mountains was purchased by the Imperial Household Agency.
In May 1903, painter :ja:野口小蘋|Noguchi Shōhin 野口小蘋 adopted Suiun as heir and husband to her daughter, Noguchi Shōkei, a painter of the bird-and-flowers genre. For a few years, Suiun exhibited paintings, including his entry Solitary Duck in Spring Scenery to the Saint Louis World's Fair in 1904, under the name Noguchi Suiun. He reverted to using the name Komuro when the marriage was annulled in November 1906.
In 1921, Suiun traveled to China and Korea for the first time. Following his return, he created a number of paintings based on his experiences including Southern Water and Northern Land, exhibited at the third Teiten in 1921; Watching the Tide at Haining, exhibited at the fourth Teiten in 1922; and The Fallen Hairpin ; exhibited at the second exhibition of the Japan Nanga Institute in 1922.
On his return to Japan, Suiun was invited to join the Japan Nanga Institute, a collective founded in Kyoto 1921 by a group of six artists, Mizuta Chikuho, Kōno Shūson, Mitsui Hanzan, Yamada Kaidō, Ikeda Keisen, and Tajika Chikuson. Suiun assumed leadership of the group until disbanding it in 1936 due to internal disagreements. The final annual exhibition of the Japan Nanga Institute was attended by French artist and writer Jean Cocteau.
Suiun was selected to travel to Berlin as the main representative of the Japan-German Friendship Special Envoy on the occasion of the German government's exhibition, Contemporary Nihonga, held from January 17 to February 28, 1931, at the Prussian Academy of Arts. He exhibited a diptych, Insect Choir, now in the collection of the Asian Art Museum, National Museums in Berlin. After his official duties were completed, Suiun traveled to France, Italy, Egypt, Ceylon, India, mainland US, and Honolulu, before returning to Yokohama on July 9, 1931.
During his journey, his ink painting Woman of Berlin was sent back to Japan. Another painting of a young European woman, Beauty, a half-length portrait in ink and light colors, was exhibited at the tenth annual Japan Nanga Institute exhibition in 1931. Silent Man of Stone, depicting the Great Sphinx of Giza, was exhibited at Teiten in 1931.
In April 1932, Suiun founded the Nanga Appreciation Society. Its goal was to popularize the appreciation and practice of nanga among the general public. The Nanga Appreciation Society issued two publications: Records of Nanga Kanshō, a serialized painting manual, published from 1932, and a monthly magazine, Nanga Kanshō, produced from January 1934 to February 1944.
In 1941, Suiun founded the Greater East Asia Southern School Institute with members of the Nanga Appreciation Society and former Japan Nanga Institute. The Greater East Asia Southern School Institute opened exhibitions of nanga painting in 1942 and 1943. The first exhibition opened in Tokyo, Kyoto, Nanjing, Shanghai, Beijing, and Shinkyō, with support from President of the Republic of China in Nanjing, Wang Jingwei, the Special Services Agency, and other government agencies. The exhibition was projected to open the following year at the same venues and in Seoul, but due to the escalation of the war, it was only held in the Japanese and Korean venues.
During the Fifteen Years War, Suiun rarely created paintings with overtly war-related themes, preferring instead subject matter that could be accommodated within the conventions of nanga while still communicating patriotic sentiments. For example, his entry for the 1942 Shin-Bunten with Free as a Bird, which depicted a kite, a bird with an institutionalized military association through the decoration Order of the Golden Kite, established in 1890.

Noted works