Atomi Kakei, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetAtomi Kakei
Japanese pedagogue, painter, and calligrapher
Date of Birth: 
Place of Birth: Ōsaka, Ōsaka Prefecture, Japan
About Atomi Kakei
- Atomi Kakei (?? ??, May 10, 1840 – January 10, 1926) was a Japanese calligrapher, Maruyama school painter, scholar of Sino-Japanese studies, and Meiji period educator.
- She founded the Atomi School in 1875 in Kanda, Tokyo, one of the oldest women's universities in Japan.Atomi Kakei was born in Osaka into the rural elite.
- Both of her parents were well-educated, and they both taught at her father's juku.
- As the daughter of a scholar of Chinese learning, she had the opportunity to be educated in the Chinese Classics, a field that was traditionally male dominated.
- She studied calligraphy under Setsuan Miyahara, a student of Sanyo Rai.
- She studied painting under painters Oryu Maruyama, Raisho Nakajima, and Hine Taizan.
- She is known for her decorative work inside the Sakura, Chiba mansion of Hotta Masatomo.In 1857, she moved to Kyoto to study.
- She returned to her family several years later to help her father run his juku.
- There, she taught painting, calligraphy, and poetry.
- By 1870, she had run a juku in Osaka for six years and in Kyoto for five.
- However, her primary interest was in art rather than education.
- That same year, she moved to Tokyo, where she later founded the Atomi School.In Tokyo, the social conditions of women in the city inspired her to reform girls' education.
- She opened another juku, which eventually grew to become the Atomi School.The Atomi School taught girls practical subjects in addition to Chinese and Japanese Classics.
- Atomi Kakei served as the head of the school until 1919, when she was replaced by her adopted daughter.
- She remained active with the school and the cause of women's education until her death in 1926.
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