Echizen Washi

My main purpose to see the works of Qi Baishi (1864-1957) and Wu Changshuo(1844-1927). Those works were good and I often came back to their works to see them again. But as the title goes, it's in the modern time when all those paintings were drawn. And I had a complexed feelings because Japan and China were at the war time.

Because all those works were collected by a Japanese diplomat at the war time, I cannot help thinking about how those Chinese artists felt when they gave their works to him. For free or selling ?

My thesis in the university was about Qi Baishi after coming back from Hangzhou, China. I learned Qi Baishi hated Japanese people because of the war. At the exhibition at Kyoto, I wished I could have known more whether the Chinese artists were happy to exchange their works to Japanese people at that time.

( the show is open until Feb 26th in Kyoto. please check and imagine the relationship between Japan and China during the war time... )