1886 b. Nov. 27th. in Tokyo. Tsuguharu Foujita. His father was a doctor in the Imperial Army, ranked General. Japanese painter and printmaker who applied Japanese ink techniques to Western style paintings. 1910 Graduated from what is now the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. Married Tomiko a fellow student. 1913 left for Paris. Divorced Tomiko. Foujita was never a surrealist however he met many of the the early group and played and socialized with them. met: Manuel Ortiz de Zarate -> and Oscar Miestchaninoff -> and Diego Rivera, Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, Pascin, Chaim Soutine ->, Fernand Leger and Juan Gris ->. He also took dance lessons from Isadora Duncan ->. 1915 Kiki was one of his models. 1917 March; met and married Fernande Barrey. Through her he met the dealer, Georges Cheron ->, and had his first exhibition that year. 1918 Trip to the south of France was organized by the Polish poet Leopold Zborowski ->, who had the idea that his artist-friends could sell pictures there to rich tourists. Foujita and his wife went along as did Soutine, Modigliani with his lover, Jeanne Hebuterne (who also posed for Foujita). 1921 June; met and started affair with Lucie Badoul who he called Youki or Rose Snow. 1922 Portrait of Man Ray's girlfriend Kiki "Reclining Nude with Toile de Jouy," the sensation of Paris at the Salon d'Automne.
Foujita had his first studio at no. 5 rue Delambre in Montparnasse where he became the envy of everyone when he eventually made enough money to install a bathtub with hot running water. Many models came over to Foujita's place to enjoy this luxury. 1924 For her 21st birthday gave Youki a big, yellow Ballot with a Basque chauffeur. The car's body was by Saoutchik and the radiator was capped with a bronze by Rodin, called The Man With a Broken Nose. ->. 1925 - 1927 etching A la Rotonde or Cafede la Rotonde, part of the Tableaux de Paris series published in 1929. 1926 Anna de Noailles -> posed her in bed. Jacqueline Barsotti was one of his favorite models 1927 Summer at the Hotel Normandy at Deauville. Another 'free' summer. Photographed by Berenice Abbott. 1929 Exhibition in Toyko which he attended with Youki. The two exhibitions were a big success and they returned to Paris the following February; with his tax debt resolved. Friend of Re Soupault. Provided introduction for Kiki's memoirs. Foujita was a major personage in Montparnasse for 18 years. There is hardly a photograph of any sizeable gathering from the period that Foujita is not in. pictured with Hermine David, Charlotte Broca, Mariette Lydis Therese Treize, Per Krohg, Kisling, Edouard Ramond, Mmme Thernot, Andre Salmon, Hermine David, Jean Dufy, Mado Anspach, Henri Broca, Lucy Krohg, Zinah Pichard, Suzy Ruef, Robert Desnos. 1930 With Robert Desnos and Youki along with Foujita's cousin, set out on a walking tour of the Burgundy region of France. 1931 Leaves Youki; (who in 1932 met and married Robert Desnos). Foujita traveled and painted all over Latin America, with his new love, Mady Lequeux . According to Theodor Fraenkel: "Foujita went out to buy cigarettes and he left for Japan, from which he returned only for a brief visit several years later." 1932 Contributed a work to the Pax Mundi, a large folio book produced by the League of Nations. Exhibited New York. 1933 Welcomed back as a minor celebrity to Japan where he stayed. 1935 Death of Mady (possibly from drugs). 1941 Became a noted producer of militaristic propaganda during the war. 1945 Leaves Japan after the war. 1954 m. Kimiyo Horiuchi, his longtime companion. 1955 French naturalisation. 1959 Oct. converted to Catholicism. Baptised in Reims cathedral with Rene Lalou (the head of the Mumm champagne house) as his godfather and Francoise Taittinger as his godmother. 1966 Designed building and decoration of the Foujita chapel in the gardens of the Mumm champagne house in Reims. 1968 Jan 29th died of cancer in Zurich, Switzerland Interred in the Cimetiere de Villiers-Le-Bacle, Essonne departement. Posthumous 2003 his coffin was reinterred at the Foujita chapel. See work -> and also -> and web -> and also ->. His works can be found in the Bridgestone Museum of Art and in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, and more than 100 in the Hirano Masakichi Art Museum in Akita. See Timeline
