Yamamura Köka (Toyonari)

Born at Shinagawa, Tokyo. REal name Toyonari. He was a pupil of Ogata Gekkö, and later entered the nihonga departent of the Tokyo Art School. Graduated and entered in the first Bunten in 1907. In 1910 at the fourth Bunten he got an honorable citation. Köka became interested in theatre and his seris of actor prints ‘Rien no hana’ (‘Flowers of the theatrical world’) was published by Watanabe between 1920 and 1922. He himself published the unusual design ‘Dancing at the New Carlton Hotel in Shanghai’ in 1924. Köka was also engaged in theatrical art and in his work he showed a wide interest in historical-and genre-painting as well as in exotism. (The Female Image: 20th Century Prints of Japanese Beauties. Hotei Publishing, 2000).