Shokin Katsuta

Shokin Katsuta was born in 1879 in Tokyo, Japan. He studied at the Tokyo Art School, mentored by Hashimoto Gaho and Okakuro Kakuzo.

Given Kakuzo’s affiliation with the Tagores in Jorasanko, Calcutta, the young artist was selected to visit India in 1906, soon after he graduated.

In his brief time in the country, he lived in Jorasanko teaching and learning with the Tagores. He also became the first Japanese artist to hold an official post at the Government College of Art, Calcutta. An artist of great skill, Katsuta was deeply influenced by Abanindranath Tagore, the Bengal school movement and his visits to Ajanta caves, Sarnath and Bodh Gaya while in India. His works during this period are mainly centred around Hindu and Buddhist mythology. Katsuta painted prolifically after his return to Japan; his works from his time in India, though, were destroyed. He died in Tokyo, aged 83, in 1963 and remains a celebrated Japanese artist. The Fukushima Museum of Modern Art held the first retrospective of his works in 1998.