Flowers before an Aquarium 草花とアカリヨム

Kiyoshi Hasegawa initially intended to pursue a diplomatic career but because of poor health opted to become an artist. He started out producing woodblock prints that incorporated the grain of the wood. He made covers for a cultural circle magazine, "Seihai"(later changed to Kamen). In 1916, he helped organize the first print group in Japan, the Japan Prints Club. In 1918, he moved to France where he spent the rest of his life. Hasegawa revived the technique of mezzotint("maniére noire"), which had declined since the invention of photography, expanding the possibilities of this medium with the addition of his own techniques and establishing a solid reputation for his prints in France. His mezzotints focused on landscapes, the entire surface rendered with a cross-hatching technique unique to Hasegawa. In the difficult conditions of postwar France, he chose a familiar tree as his main motif, using it to express the meaning and mystery of everything that exists in this world and the universe to which it is connected. During the same period, the subject matter of his prints shifted from landscape to plants and animals. According to the artist,“In many cases, the small bird is a 'spirit' or myself,the fish is 'matiére', the grass, flowers, and seeds express the mystery of nature, and roses symbolize eternal beauty or truth. The act of playing dice alone is human life, the image of chess shows the struggles of life, and the conical form and universal equations refer to the universal truth of the world.” The arrangement and relationship of still-life objects depicted in Hasegawa's prints all have meanings that arise from his mind and feelings. Hasegawa was also one of the first Japanese artists to do innovative work in the medium of engraving.