Chiura Obata, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death

Chiura Obata

Japanese-American artist

Date of Birth: 18-Nov-1885

Place of Birth: Okayama Prefecture, Japan

Date of Death: 06-Oct-1975

Profession: painter

Nationality: United States

Zodiac Sign: Scorpio

Chiura Obata (?? ??, Obata Chiura, November 18, 1885 – October 6, 1975) was a well-known Japanese-American artist and popular art teacher.
He emigrated to the United States in 1903 and embarked on a seven-decade career that saw the enactment of anti-immigration laws and the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II.
A self-described "roughneck", Obata went to the United States in 1903, at age 17.
After initially working as an illustrator and commercial decorator, he had a successful career as a painter, following a 1927 summer spent in the Sierra Nevada, and was a faculty member in the Art Department at the University of California, Berkeley, from 1932 to 1954, interrupted by World War II, when he spent over a year in internment camps.
After his retirement, he continued to paint and to lead group tours to Japan to see gardens and art.
He nevertheless emerged as a leading figure in the Northern California art scene and as an influential educator, teaching at the University of California, Berkeley, for nearly twenty years and acting as founding director of art schools in two of the internment camps.