276 - HIROSHI YOSHIDA: MOONLIT COASTAL LANDSCAPE WITH PINE TREE

HIROSHI YOSHIDA: MOONLIT COASTAL LANDSCAPE WITH PINE TREE By Hiroshi Yoshida (1876-1950), signed H. Yoshida Japan, early 20th century Ink and watercolors on paper. Set inside a frame, behind glass. Depicting a tranquil coastal landscape by moonlight, with a large pine tree extending its branches across the upper composition and framing the expansive body of water beyond. The moonlight casts a soft, luminous reflection across the distant sea, while low vegetation and rocks define the shoreline in the foreground. Inscription: To the lower right, signed H. Yoshida in Roman script. Image SIZE 28.5 x 37.2 cm, SIZE incl. frame 40.3 x 48.1 cm Provenance: From a Swedish private collection. Condition: Very good condition. The sheet with rubbing to color, foxing and staining to the back. The outer edge and reverse with strips of paper from previous mounting. Hiroshi Yoshida (1876-1950) began his artistic training with his adoptive father in Kurume, Fukuoka prefecture. Around the age of twenty, he left Kurume to study with Soritsu Tamura in Kyoto, subsequently moving to Tokyo and the tutelage of Shotaro Koyama. Yoshida studied Western-style painting, winning many exhibition prizes, and making several trips to the United States, Europe and North Africa selling his watercolors and oil paintings. While highly successful as an oil painter and watercolor artist, Hiroshi Yoshida turned to woodblock printmaking upon learning of the Western world’s infatuation with ukiyo-e. While widely traveled and knowledgeable of Western aesthetics, he maintained an allegiance to traditional Japanese techniques and traditions. Museum comparison: Compare a closely related watercolor painting by the same artist, dated 1907, 59.6 x 80.5 cm, in the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo, collection ID no. W00001. Auction comparison: Compare a closely related watercolor depicting two fishing boats, by the same artist, dated to the early 20 th century, size 50.4 x 67 cm, at Bonhams, Snow, Sex and Spectacle, 13 May 2021, London, lot 328 (sold for GBP 19,000 or approx. EUR 28,500 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing).