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Leonard Tsuguharu Foujita, also known as Fujita
(藤田 嗣治, November 27,
1886–January 29, 1968) was a painter and
engraver born in Tokyo, Japan who applied French
oil techniques to Japanese-style paintings.

In 1910 Foujita graduated from what is now the
Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music.
Three years later he went to Montparnasse in
Paris, France. When he arrived there, knowing
nobody, he met Amedeo Modigliani, Pascin,  Chaim
Soutine, and Fernand Leger practically the same
night and within a week became friends with Juan
Gris, Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse.

Foujita had his first studio at no. 5 rue Delambre
in Montparnasse where he became the envy of
everyone when he eventually made enough money to
install a bathtub with hot running water. Many
models came over to Foujita's place to enjoy this
luxury, among them Man Ray|Man Ray's very
liberated lover, Alice Prin|Kiki, who boldly posed
for Foujita in the nude in the outdoor courtyard.
Another portrait of Kiki titled "Reclining Nude
with Toile de Jouy," shows her lying naked against
an ivory-white background. It was the sensation of
Paris at the Salon d'Automne in 1922, selling for
more than 8,000 francs.

In March of 1917 in the café La Rotonde, Foujita
was hit by lightning in the form of a young lady
by the name of Fernande Barrey. At first, she
totally ignored Foujita's efforts to engage her in
conversation. However, early the next morning,
Foujita showed up at Fernande's place with a blue
corsage he'd made overnight. Intrigued, she
offered him a pot of tea and they were married 13
days later. 

Within a few years, particularly after his 1918
exposition, he achieved great fame as a painter of
beautiful women and cats in a very original
technique. He is one of the few Montparnasse
artists who made a great deal of money in his
early years. By 1925, Tsuguharu Foujita had
received the Belgian Order of Leopold I of
Belgium|King Leopold I and the French government
awarded him the Legion of Honor.

In 1918, a trip to the south of France was
organized by the Polish poet Leopold Zborowski,
who had the idea that his artist-friends could
sell pictures there to rich tourists. Foujita and
his wife went along as did Soutine, Modigliani
with his lover, Jeanne Hébuterne. The trip was
not, however, a success and the group had to
survive on the advances that Foujita had obtained
from his Paris dealer. By the time the final
reckoning arrived even those funds had run out,
and their landlord, ignoring their worthless
pieces of art, confiscated all their baggage in
lieu of payment.

After the breakup of his third marriage, and his
flight to Brazil in 1931 (with his new love,
Mady), Foujita traveled and painted all over Latin
America, giving hugely successful exhibitions
along the way. In Buenos Aires, Argentina, 60,000
people attended his exhibition, and more than
10,000 queued up for his autograph. Two years
later he was welcomed back as a star to Japan
where he stayed until 1939.  His works can be
found in the Bridgestone Museum of Art and in the
Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, and more than
100 in the Hirano Masakichi Art Museum in Akita
(city)|Akita.

His last major work was the decoration of a chapel
in Reims|Reims, France, which he completed in
1966, not long before his death.

Tsuguharu Foujita died of cancer on January 29,
1968 in Zürich, Switzerland and was interred in
the Cimetière de Villiers-Le-Bacle,
Essonne|Essonne departement, France.