University Art Museum, Kyoto City University of Arts

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Graduation works include pieces by famous modern artists like Kagaku Murakami, Bakusen Tsuchida and Shinso Okamoto

An historic art collection visually telling the story from when the university was the Kyoto Prefectural School of Painting

This is a university art museum working to preserve and organize works to show to the public. It was opened by Kyoto City University of Arts, a college with some 140 years of history dating back to when it opened in 1880 in the Imperial Palace grounds as the Kyoto Prefectural School of Painting. The Meiji painter Chokunyu Tanomura got the collection rolling by donating paintings, calligraphy and tea utensils. The collection has now grown to some 4,000 pieces encompassing Japanese paintings, designs, Oriental paintings, pictures, woodblock prints, ceramics, dyed fabrics, folk items, Tosa school painting materials, and sketches once possessed by Soritsu Tamura (1846~1918) as well as the artworks and reference materials of graduates. And, notably, some of these graduation pieces now grab the attention of the art world because the student-artists have gone on to become leading lights in Kyoto arts, such as Bakusen Tsuchida (1887~1936) and Kagaku Murakami (1888~1939). Also, sketches and roughs used in teaching art are attracting attention, so the museum is making them available to the public in illustrated catalogs and planned exhibitions.