Saburo Hasegawa

Western-style painter. Born in Chofu, Yamaguchi Prefecture (now Shimonoseki City), his family moved to Kobe soon after. During high school, he entered the Shinanobashi Western-style Painting Institute in Osaka, where he studied under Koide Narashige. In 1929 (Showa 4), he graduated from the Department of Aesthetics and Art History, Faculty of Letters, Tokyo Imperial University, and in the same year traveled to America and various European countries to study. He exhibited at the Salon d'Automne, where he was introduced to abstract painting, and returned to Japan in 1932. He formed the New Age Western Painting Exhibition with his comrades, and then founded the Free Artists Association in 1937, but gradually shifted his interest to the tea ceremony, Zen, haiku, and photography. He began producing abstract paintings before the Second World War, and after the war produced many woodblock, ink-wash, and sumi-e works. In 1954, he traveled to the United States as a representative of the Japan-US Abstract Art Exhibition, and returned to Japan the following year. He returned to the United States as a visiting professor at the San Francisco Art Institute, and died there on March 11, 1957. His representative works include "Trail of the Butterfly," "Rhapsody Fishing Village," "Nature," "Heavenly Bodies and People," and others.

[Tadao Ogura]

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

洋画家。山口県長府（現下関(しものせき)市）生まれ。ほどなく一家は神戸に移住。高校時代に大阪の信濃橋(しなのばし)洋画研究所に入り、小出楢重(こいでならしげ)に師事する。1929年（昭和4）東京帝国大学文学部美学美術史学科を卒業し、同年アメリカを経てヨーロッパ各国へ遊学。サロン・ドートンヌに出品、抽象絵画の洗礼を受けて32年帰国した。同志と新時代洋画展を結成、さらに37年自由美術家協会を創立するが、しだいに茶道、禅、俳句、写真に関心を移す。第二次世界大戦前から抽象絵画を制作し、戦後は木版、拓版、水墨の作品を多く制作している。54年（昭和29）日米抽象美術展の代表として渡米し、翌年一時帰国後、サンフランシスコ美術大学客員教授として再渡米、昭和32年3月11日同地で客死。代表作に『蝶(ちょう)の軌跡』『狂詩曲漁村』『自然』『天体と人』ほかがある。

［小倉忠夫］

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