Kazuo Kudo1933~ 工藤和男

Kudo Kazuo is a Japanese Western-style oil painter born in Oita City, Oita Prefecture in 1933, known for powerful figurative works depicting fishermen and laborers in maritime settings. He first exhibited with the Sogenkai Exhibition in 1957, graduated from Musashino Art University in 1962, and joined the Sogenkai association in 1963. After his first acceptance into the Nitten in 1965, he was nominated seven times for the Yasui Award, won the French Art Prize in Paris in 1976 and a Nitten Special Selection the same year, and served as a Nitten judge from 1977. He served as president of the Sogenkai from 1998 to 2014 and currently chairs the association while continuing to serve as a Nitten councilor. The Kudo Kazuo Art Museum opened in 2015 within the Kyushu Geijutsu no Mori complex in Oita.