Kanō Tomonobu (狩野友信) (artist 1843 – 1912)

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Biography:

Laurance Roberts wrote on page 69 in A Dictionary of Japanese Artists...: "Son of Kanō Tōsen Nakanobu, eighth-generation head of Hamachō Kanō line. After the early death of his father he studied with Kanō Shōsen'in of the Kobikichō Kanō, along with Hashimoto Gahō and Kanō Gōhei and Kanō Hōgai. Appointed as goyō eshi to the Tokugawa shogunate. After the restoration entered the Bansho Shirabesho (Foreign Literature Investigating Office), where he studied Western painting."

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"B. Edo. Used the gō Isseisai and Shunsen. Son of Kanō Nakanobu, eighth-generation head of Hamachō Kanō line. After the early death of his father he studied with Kano Shōsen'in of the Kobikichō Kanō; after Meiji Restoration, studied with Charles Wirgman and at Foreign Literature Investigating Office. Became assistant professor at Tokyo School of Fine Arts in 1888."

Quoted from: Guide to Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints by Helen Merritt, p. 54.

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Both the Czech artist Emil Orlik (1870-1932) and the American Helen Hyde studied painting with Tomonobu. Lilian Miller (1895-1942) was born and raised in Japan where she studied Nihonga painting with Tomonobu.

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Tomonobu was one of the contributors to the production of the Choix de fables de La Fontaine. Others in the Lyon Collection who worked with him on this were Okakura Shūsui and Kajita Hankō.

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"Fenollosa began to study painting with Kano Tomonobu (1843–1912), a Kano painter formerly in the Kobikichō shogunal studio who taught draftsmanship at the university, and he also studied painting history and theory with Kano Eitoku and Sumiyoshi Hirokata, both formerly high-ranking official artists with whom he had likely become acquainted through Tomonobu."

Quoted from: Making Modern Japanese-Style Painting: Kano Hogai and the Search for Images by Chelsea Foxwell, p. 69.