Helen HYDE (1868-1919) Born in Lima, New York in 1868. In her new home of Oakland, California, Helen studied painting with Ferdinand Richardt from the age of twelve to fourteen. After her father's death in 1882, Helen was supported by a wealthy aunt in San Francisco. In 1890, after studies at the San Francisco School of Design and the Art Students League of New York, Hyde went to Europe with her younger sister, and studied with Franz Skarbina at the Hochschule fur Bildende Berlin, and then from 1891 to 1894, in Paris with Raphael Collin, Albert Stermer, and Felix Regamey. She was particularly influenced by the most fervently Japonisan of this group, Regamey, and she aspired to a career as an illustrator. After returning to America, she studied etching technique with Josephine Maria Hyde. In September 1899 she traveled to Japan with Josephine. She met Ernest Fenollosa and was greatly influenced by him. Hyde studied Japanese painting techniques from Tomonobu Kano, and through the encouragement of Fenollosa, she began making wood-block prints. At first she created these prints with the cooperation of the block carvers and printers employed by art dealer and publisher, Bunshichi Kobayashi, but she later studied woodblock tech-niques with Emil Orlik, then resident in Japan. Through the efforts of Tomonobu, her print, Monarch of Japan, was exhibited in the 1901 10th exhibition of the Nihon Kaiga Kyokai where it received a 1st Prize Honorable Mention. The themes of "Mother and Child" and "Lovely Children" established around this time were also extremely popular in America. After briefly returning to America, Hyde came back to Japan, and she rented a Japanese-style house in Akasaka of Tokyo where she lived and worked. She devoted her mornings to creating works, and her afternoons to an active social life. While she returned to America many times for one-woman shows and for medical treatment until her final return to America in 1914, she continued to create works of art and travel to such countries as India, China and Mexico during her more than ten-year stay in Japan. Her international reputation is notable in the Gold Medal she received for her Baby Talk (1908, cat.no.25) at the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exhibition in Seattle in 1909, and the acceptance of her work in the Salon exhibition in Paris. Even as she continued her life-long battle against illness after her return to America in 1914, she received a Bronze Prize at the Panama-Pacific Inter-national Exhibition, held individual shows in Chicago and South Carolina, and energetically pursued her experimentation with woodblock prints at the Provincetown artist colony. In March 1919, Hyde collapsed at her younger sister's home in Pasadena, California, and she died on May 13,1919. Source: Eyes Toward Asia, 1996 Yokohama Art Museum exhibition catalog. , Helen Hyde was born in Lima, New York on April 6, 1868, the granddaughter of California pioneers who had crossed the continent in a covered wagon. At age 14, Helen moved to San Francisco eventually studying under Ferdinand Richardt and at the San Francisco School of Design under Emil Carlson, and later at the Art Students League of New York. In 1890, Hyde went to Europe and studied with Franz Skarbina at the Hochschule fur Bildende Berlin, and then from 1891 to 1894, in Paris with Raphael Collin, Albert Stermer, and Felix Regamey. She was particularly influenceed by Regamey, who had already spent years in East Asia. After returning from Europe to America, she studied etching technique with Josephine Maria Hyde. In September 1899 she traveled to Japan with Josephine. She met Ernest Fenellosa, an American proponent of Japanese art, and was greatly influenced by him. Hyde studied Japanese painting techniques from Tomonobu Kano, and with the encouragement of Fenellosa, she began making woodblock prints. Through the efforts of Tomonobu, her print Monarch of Japan was exhibited in the 1901 10th exhibition of the Nihon Kaiga Kyokai where it received a 1st Prize Honorable Mention. The themes of Mother and Child and Lovely Children established around this time were also extremely popular in America. Hyde moved to Japan and rented a home in Tokyo, where she lived and worked. Her international recognition is notable in the Gold Medal she received for Baby Talk at the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exhibition in Seattle in 1909, and the acceptance of her work in the 1909 Paris Salon. Even as she continued her life-long battle against illness, she received a Bronze Prize at the Panama-Pacific International Exhibition, and held individual shows in Chicago and South Carolina.