Watanabe Nobukazu (1872-1944), Winter battle near Ushio - Sino-Japanese War, 1894

color woodcut, ink, paper, triptych, 37x75 cm (3 x 37x25 cm), artist's signature

Watanabe Nobukazu (1872-1944), Tokyo-based printmaker and painter. Considered the best disciple of Chikanobu Toyohara (1838-1912), he worked in a variety of genres, from images of beautiful women (biinga) to famous views of modernizing Tokyo (kaika-e), including depictions of national industrial exhibitions, images of the emperor and empress, and Sino-Japanese and Russian-Japanese war prints (senso-e). He is probably best known for his battle graphics. During the Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895), Nobukazu produced a significant number of outstanding triptychs and gained recognition designing battle scenes on land and sea.