Léonard Foujita – New stamp issue from France

Tsuguharu Fujita, Leonard Foujita, was born in 1886 in Tokyo, Japan. He studied at the School of Fine Arts in Tokyo from 1905-1908 and arrives in Europe in 1913. He will move to Paris two years later. He had his surname Frenchified.

Foujita paints street scenes of Paris and the suburbs. He exhibits in various Parisian galleries (Salon d’automne, Salon des Independants). Little by little the artist achieves a synthesis between oriental calligraphy and western art. During the 20’s, he develops a technique using smooth and bright predominantly ivory paint, on which traces of clean lines prolifereate with bright contours. Foujita composes his workshop series, still lifes, nudes, self portraits, and cats; he will also paint mondane portraits, as well as a number of religious paintings on gold backgrounds.

In the 30’s, Foujita will divide his time between Paris and Tokyo. He will paint several murals. He returns to his native country in 1940 and will work, during the war, as an artistic attache and official painter of the ministry of the Army. He will serve his country with his art, painting war scenes or exalting victories of the japanese army. Foujita will know a a period of purgatory in Europe in the years immediately after the war.

He visits New York in 1949, then returns to live in Paris the following year. His style will change, accumulating new lines and details (Fables of La Fontaine, children’s portraits, countrysides and views of Paris). He will again paint numerous religious themes. Tsuguharu Foujita obtains french nationality in 1955. In 1959, Foujita converts to catholocism and is baptized at Reims cathedral ; it is at this time that he changes his first name to Leonard. Foujita will create frescoes and stainglass for the chapel of Notre-Dame-de-la-Paix in Reims (1965-1966). Leonard Foujita died in Zurich, Switzerland in 1968.