Seysi (清志)

Carriera · Tokyo

Leaving Art School

Dissatisfied with Antonio Fontanesi's successor, Yamashita left the Kobu Bijutsu Gakko art school in 1880.

Viaggio · 1880–1881

Constantinople and Alexandria en Route to Russia

On the way to Russia Yamashita visited Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, and in Alexandria she put on a European dress for the first time.

Viaggio · December 1880

Departure from Yokohama for Russia

At the initiative of Nicholas (Kasatkin), Yamashita sailed from Yokohama for Russia in December 1880 to study icon painting.

Carriera · 1881–1883 · Saint Petersburg

Copying the Masters in the Hermitage, Jordan's Influence

In St. Petersburg Yamashita visited the Hermitage, making copies of works by Western European masters; her teachers included Fyodor Jordan, rector of the Academy of Arts, whose influence remained evident in her work to the end of her life.

Viaggio · March 1881 · Saint Petersburg

Arrival in St. Petersburg, the Icon-Painting Workshop

Yamashita arrived in St. Petersburg in March 1881, becoming the first Japanese woman to come to Russia to study, and entered the icon-painting workshop of the Novodevichy Resurrection Convent.

Carriera · 1883–1918

Icon Painter at the Orthodox Mission in Tokyo

Yamashita worked as an icon painter at the church of the Orthodox mission in Tokyo until 1918; she was supported by the head of the mission, Nicholas (Kasatkin), who affectionately called her "our icon painter Irina Petrovna."

Viaggio · spring 1883 · Tokyo

Return to Japan

Owing to health problems, a conflict with Abbess Evstolia, who forbade her visits to the Hermitage, and an unhappy episode in her personal life, Yamashita left for Japan in the spring of 1883 and settled in Tokyo at the Orthodox mission.

Opera

The Icon "Resurrection of Christ" for the Tsesarevich

An icon of the Resurrection of Christ by Yamashita was presented to the heir to the Russian throne, Nicholas Alexandrovich, in 1891 during his visit to Japan; it is now her only icon in Russia and is kept in the Hermitage.

Famiglia · 1905–1908

Deaths of Her Elder Brother and Mother

The artist's elder brother died in 1905, and her mother three years later.

Viaggio

Return to Her Native Kasama

After the Russian Revolution undermined the Church's financial support, Yamashita left Tokyo and returned to her native Kasama, where she lived in retirement for another thirty years on her savings and payments from the Church.

L’epoca

Loss of Works in the Tokyo Earthquake

Some of Yamashita's works, including her best, perished in the Tokyo earthquake of 1923, and others later during the Second World War.

Morte · 26 gennaio 1939

Kasama