Yoshida is the fourth artist in the family lineage of eight artists spanning from the mid 1800s through today. Early in his art career, he studied with two well known Japanese teachers in the Western style of painting. Yoshida was a successful oil painter and watercolor artist. In 1899, his work exhibited at the Detroit Art Institute when he was just 23 years old. He went on to travel in the east coast of the U.S. and then in Europe. In 1920, he began working in woodblock prints after learning of the desirability of these in western markets.
He is most associated with the Shin Hanga style which means “new print”. This style created a fusion of traditional print imagery from a blend of Ukiyo-e forms and themes with more current European art styles. Yoshida traveled widely and produced images inspired by trips to India and the Taj Mahal, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Singapore, the Grand Canyon and other U.S. National Parks, and the Swiss Alps.
Though he is most associated with the Shin Hanga style, he later established a school that combined elements of all three major printmaking movements (Ukiyo-e, Shin Hanga and Sosaku Hanga) to accomplish final hand-printed editions based on his philosophy to inspire young artists to follow their hearts. His works held in museum collections world wide including the Brooklyn Museum, the Dallas Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Tokyo Fuji Art museum, among many others.
(1876 – 1950)