須田国太郎

Suda Kunitarō was born on June 6, 1891 in Kyoto’s Shimogyō Ward (present-day Nakagyō Ward) to a wealthy merchant family descended from the famous Ōmi traders of old. While it would not be unusual for the head of such a family to have literary or artistic tastes, Suda apparently knew little of his father’s interest in “shoga” (painting and calligraphy) or his mother’s fondness for waka poetry. Therefore, one cannot really say he grew up in a particularly creative home environment. Reading boys’ magazines at an early age was his first exposure to painting, prior to entering junior high school where he studied Western-style painting under Yokoyama Tsunegorō, an exponent of Nihonga (Japanese-style painting). Seeing images of works by van Gogh at the Maruzen bookstore in Kyoto set alight a determination to become a Western-style painter. Right from the start, he wondered intently why painting in the East had developed differently from painting in the West. Wanting to investigate the matter further, and still unsure how to go about becoming a painter, he entered the department of philosophy in the College of Literature at Kyoto Imperial University in 1913. The young man was fortunate to encounter among his professors Fukada Yasukazu, a pioneering scholar of aesthetics and Aristotle. As Suda pondered the concept of realism, Fukada was able to guide him back to the ancient Greeks. In his graduation thesis, entitled “Realism,” he argued that genuine realism, rather than imitating an objective reality, arose from the “subjective action” of exploring the possibilities surrounding a subject to express its truth. Genuine realism thus transcended the ordinary realism that pervaded the world. Suda had hit upon the path he would follow as a painter, but apart from a period spent studying drawing at Kansai Bijutsuin (Kansai Art Institute), he remained practically self-taught. Seeking to learn more, he departed for Spain in 1919, and for the next four years or so he traveled around Europe from his base in Madrid, sketching landscapes and visiting museums and galleries to absorb the art of various periods. At the Museo del Prado, he enthusiastically copied great works by such master painters as Titian, Tintoretto, El Greco, Luis de Morales, and Goya, deepening his understanding of the importance of techniques and materials for expression. Convinced that the basis of modernity in Western painting was the shift that had occurred from the color brilliance of the Renaissance to the light-and-shade contrast of the Baroque, Suda explored the relationship between these two streams by breathing in the old techniques. The experience consolidated his understanding of the history and philosophy of art. Neither the different approaches to realism nor the expressive differences in the pictorial art of East and West could be grasped, he decided, without reckoning with the characteristics and effects of the materials and techniques that were employed. He believed that painters from the various periods and regions, after first assessing and selecting their materials, had each created the most suitable techniques for expressing the truth they pursued. Suda’s study of art history helped him find his way as a painter; in turn, his self-education in the medium deepened his understanding of art history. After returning to Japan, he earned his living as an art history teacher at Wakayama Economics Academy and Kyoto Imperial University, while continuing to paint. In 1932, he held his first solo exhibition at the Shiseido Gallery in Tokyo’s Ginza, encouraged by the painter Kamisaka Shōtō, a friend of his older brother, and by supporters at the Kansai Art Institute. Although it is hard to say the showing attracted much attention, among those who did manage to see it were Satomi Katsuzō and Kawaguchi Kigai. They invited Suda to join the Dokuritsu Bijutsu Kyōkai (Independent Art Association) in 1934. From this point on—he was 43 by now—he concentrated more on pursuing a career as a painter. Because of his late debut and lack of formal schooling as an artist, as well as his background as an aesthetician and art historian, many people mistook him for a scholar who merely dabbled in oil painting as a hobby. In fact, as we have seen, he had aspired to be a painter ever since he was a boy; his innate modesty probably explains his slow progress in making a name for himself. After joining the Independent Art Association and meeting friendly rivals like Kobayashi Wasaku, he continued to produce many fine works, using the Association’s exhibitions (Dokuritsuten) as his main forum. Eventually his unique painting style won high acclaim, and in 1947 he became a member of the prestigious Nihon Geijutsuin (Japan Art Academy). Nevertheless, despite the recognition, he remained a humble searcher: until shortly before his death in 1961, at the age of 70, he continued to nurse a wish to return to Spain to study. Suda’s style changed and deepened during the 30 years that followed his first solo exhibition, but the marrying of rich colors and light-and-dark contrast within an overall dark picture plane remained the basis of his expression—a distinctive technique that traced its roots to his Spanish sojourn. In other words, to grasp Suda’s art, we need to start by considering the insights and knowledge he gained while based in Spain. As already mentioned, by copying masterpieces at the Museo del Prado, Suda realized that the modernity of Western painting involved a fundamental shift in expression: the color diversity of Renaissance painting gave way to the unifying power of light found in Baroque painting. While fascinated by the Renaissance color brilliance achieved by layering translucent paint, particularly as seen in works by the Venetian School, he considered expression that was not realized “under a single unified ray of light” to be flawed. The weakness, he assessed, was overcome by the painters of the Baroque who unified their picture plane by means of sharply contrasted light and dark areas. More specifically, the dark areas activated the brilliance, tension, dynamism, and fluidity of the light areas, and it was this quality that had advanced the development of realism unique to Western painting. In his view, the methods of oil painting and the effects of Baroque chiaroscuro led Western painting in a different direction from painting in the East. On the other hand, the Baroque style meant foregoing the inherent color brilliance of the earlier era. The emergence of modern painting, Suda believed, could essentially be traced to the need to find solutions to this problem. The task of restoring color brilliance became a challenge taken up, for example, by the Impressionists with their technique of broken color (juxtaposing different colored paints without mixing them). In other words, while Suda viewed the history of Western painting since the Renaissance from the perspective of the transition in expression from color to light and shade, he also recognized that what constantly vitalized the process was the artists’ pursuit of the “real.” The issues that came into focus for him, through his study of art history, must have posed unrelenting challenges for his own art. It is sometimes said that the most conspicuous characteristic of Suda’s paintings is their “blackness.” Close observation of the works, however, reveals not a simple black but one resulting from the layering of many colors. By adopting taxing and laborious techniques—applying paint and overpainting, wiping off, scraping back, and reapplying—he sought in his own way to rediscover and reconcile both the color expression of the Renaissance and the chiaroscuro of the Baroque. His desire to overcome the respective weaknesses of each, and thereby reach the “real,” is expressed by the depth of blackness in his works. His art can be regarded as one painter’s unstinting response to the great achievements of Western art history. His contemplation of truth in painting led him, beyond words, to the depiction of a “genuine reality.” (Kajioka Shuichi / Translated by Ota So & Walter Hamilton) (Published online: 2025-02-10)