Ohara Koson Birds and Flowers

<p>Ohara Koson (also Ohara H?son Ohara Sh?son) (Kanazawa 1877 - Tokyo 1945) was a Japanese painter and woodblock print designer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries at the forefront of shinsaku-hanga and shin-hanga art movements.</p><p>Ohara Koson studied painting and design at the Ishikawa Prefecture Technical School in 1889-1893. He also studied painting with Suzuki Kason (1860-1919) although accounts differ on whether this happened during his school years or after he moved to Tokyo in the middle to late 1890s.</p><p>In 1904 Koson created prints depicting the Russo-Japanese War see authors´ book <em>Russo-Japanese War.</em> This was a common practice among ukiyo-e artists during that time as many of them produced illustration prints related to either the Sino-Japanese War (1894/95) or the Russo-Japanese War (1904/05) see authors´ books <em>Sino-Japanese War</em> and <em>Russo-Japanese War</em>.</p><p>Despite the decline of ukiyo-e Ohara Koson managed to maintain financial stability due to his position as a teacher at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts where Koson encountered Ernest Fenellosa an American advocate of traditional Japanese art.</p>