Spring Warmth

A white horse, bathed in the spring sunshine, is napping in a poppy field. Kogetsu completed this Romanticist painting under the guidance of Okakura Tenshin.

Saigo Kogetsu was born Saigo Meguru in Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture. After the Meiji Restoration, he moved to Tokyo, where he first studied under Kano Tomonobu. When the Tokyo Fine Arts School opened its doors in 1889, he became a member of its first class. Everyone anticipated a rosy future for him, when he was hired as an associate professor at his alma mater simultaneously with his completion of the postgraduate course in 1896 and he married the daughter of Hashimoto Gaho. Traveling extensively, he still participated actively in mostly the Nihon Bijutsuin (Japan Art Institute), but he became ill while journeying through Taiwan in the spring of 1912 and after returning to Japan, died at the age of 40. Spring warmth was exhibited in the Kaiga Kyoshinkai (Competitive Painting Exhibition) in the autumn of 1897, where it received a bronze medal. According to Kogetsu’s recollections of the production of the painting, he at first had intended to paint a farm horse napping in the middle of a rice paddy with rape blossoms in fullbloom, but to avoid technical problems, he decided to turn it into a barebacked horse in a poppy field. While he himself considered this change a mistake, it has made the work transcend a simple scene of a farming village and has transformed it into a Romanticist painting with an exotic ambience. In addition, Kogetsu expressed the gentle light of spring by applying a thin coat of gold paint to the sky. (Writer : Tamon Takase Source : Selected Masterpieces from The University Art Museum, Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music: Grand Opening Exhibition, The University Art Museum, Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, 1999)