Lot 157: Washroom, 1930s

PROPERTY FROM THE JACOBSON/HASHIMOTO COLLECTION
Washroom, 1930s
Gelatin silver print. 28.9 x 20 cm. (11 3/8 x 7 7/8 in).   Titled in Japanese in pencil and credit stamp on the verso.

 Acquired directly from the Estate of the artist

Born in Kyoto, Shikanosuke Yagaki was a banker who became interested in photography as a teenager. After graduating in 1920 from Doshisha University, where he studied English literature, Yagaki continued to work in finance whilst keeping up his avid interest in photography. In the 1930s he was active in several of the many amateur photography clubs then flourishing in Japan: the Sanwa Bank Photo Club, the Karashishi-kai Photo Group, and the Kyoto Leica Club. Despite a lack of professional training, Yagaki created a truly modernist technique through his personal studies. He combines a surreal European study of light and shadow with traditional Japanese subject matter of Geisha, streetlife, architecture and still life. His work was widely exhibited throughout Japan in the 1930s and 1940s, including the International Photo Salons and the All Japan Association of Photographic Societies exhibitions.
Yagaki’s work is held in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Cleveland Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. All the works presented here for sale by Shikanosuke Yagaki are believed to be unique.