(b Tokyo, 19 April 1912; d Tokyo, 8 June 1948). Japanese painter. He lost his hearing when he was 15. In 1929 he entered the Pacific Painting Institute, Tokyo. In 1935 he was selected to submit works to the 22nd exhibition of the Nikakai (Second Division Society) and he continued to submit works annually until 1942. He also showed works in other exhibitions, for example with the NOVA Bijutsu Kyokai (NOVA Art Society) and Form. In 1936 with his wife Sachiko he published the monthly journal Zakkicho, which contained miscellaneous writings and designs. Numerous cultural figures and painters contributed to it and 12 issues were published in 1937. In 1940 he joined the Kyushitsukai (Nine-Room Society) which was a gathering of avant-garde painters from the Nikakai. When the arts magazine Mizue published the article ‘Kokubo kokka to bijutsu’ (‘The military state and art’) in January 1941, a discussion concerning the cooperation of painters in the war, Matsumoto contributed the rebuttal ‘Ikite-iru gakka’ (‘The living painter’) in April 1941 in the same journal. Amid the inevitable interruption of exhibitions by artists’ groups caused by World War II, Matsumoto, with seven other painters, including Ai Mitsu and Tsuruoka Masao (b 1907), formed the Shinjin Gakai (New People’s Painting Society) in 1943. After the war, in 1947, he joined the Jiyu Bijitsukai (Free Art Society); however, the following year he contracted tuberculosis.

• Matsumoto, Shunsuke
  • Japan, §VI, 5(v)(b): Avant-garde painting, after 1945