Painting on silk in mineral pigments, sumi ink and gofun or clam shell gesso mounted as a gaku or framed panel, depicting a beautiful young woman dressed in kimono and hakama with a branch of flowering white plum. Signed on the right side: Horyu, and sealed (Goseda Horyu II, the go or art name of Goseda Yoshio, 1864 – 1943). In the original period frame of East Indian rosewood and beveled silk brocade. Meiji Era, circa 1893 – 1912.

Born in Ibaraki Prefecture in 1864, the 6th son of a master carpenter, Goseda Horyu II’s given name was Shinokichi. In 1878 he moved to Tokyo and joined the Goseda-juku or atelier of Goseda Horyu I to study painting. In 1880 he was adopted by Goseda Horyu I as his first son and given the new name, Yoshio. In 1881 he studied oil painting at Kobu Bijutsu Gakko (later the Tokyo Bijutsu Gakko or Tokyo Fine Arts School). That year he first exhibited at the 2nd Naikoku Kangyo Hakurankai (Domestic Industrial Exhibition). In 1885 he inherited the art name of Horyu II. In 1889 he was one of the founding members of the Meiji Bijutsukai, the first Western painting association in Japan, a venue with which he continued to exhibit. In 1900 he exhibited at the Paris Exposition. In 1910 he was sent by the Ministry of Agriculture and Industry to paint a mural in the British Museum titled: The Change in Japanese Custom from Ancient Times to the Present. Then in 1926 he exhibited a painting depicting the Rescue Activities by the Red Cross in the Great Kanto Earthquake in the Philadelphia Exposition. He died at home in Tokyo on January 9, 1943.

Goseda Horyu II worked both as a Nihonga artist in traditional mineral pigments and as a Yoga artist in Western oils. His paintings ranged from landscapes to genre and historical subjects, including portraits of important figures of the Meiji and Taisho Eras. His work is in the Imperial Collections and the Tokyo National Museum.

This portrait breathes with an almost photographic realism. Extremely delicate brushwork details the face and hair of the young beauty, a girl of about eighteen about to embark on formal studies. She glows with an inner confidence and sense of optimism.

The subject may very well be Tsuda Umeko. She was born in 1864 in Edo, and named Ume. In 1871 at the age of six she joined the Iwakura mission to the United States, the youngest among the five students. She studied in Georgetown, in Washington, D.C. and returned to Japan in November 1882 at the age of eighteen. This portrait portrays a young woman of the same age, dressed in hakama, clothing associated with women’s education. Ume or Japanese plum is a flower associated with the first month of the year just after her return and is the same character as her name, Ume. In 1885 Ume was hired to teach English at the Peeresses’ school established by the Imperial Household. At the age of 24 in 1889 she returned to the United States to pursue further education at Bryn Mawr. She studied English literature, German, philosophy and biology. She shone academically, particularly in the sciences. While at Bryn Mawr she became an accomplished public speaker and helped establish an American support network for Japanese women’s education, starting with a scholarship fund for Japanese women to study abroad. In 1900 after returning to Tokyo she established a school to give women of all social classes the access to higher education. That school is Tsuda University today. In 1902 she became legally independent from her family, and modernized her name by the addition of the character ko, becoming Umeko.