The GAM also testifies to the exceptional union between Japan and the Mediterranean, made up of the works of the couple Vincenzo Ragusa and ‘O Tama Kiyohara. Vincenzo Ragusa was among the artists and craftsmen called by the emperor of Tokyo to modernize his kingdom and bring it closer to western culture; the artist knows the girl, who at 17 poses for him and falls in love with him and the two return together to Sicily where they will create an artistic partnership and a school of applied arts, a unique example in the regional and national panorama.
Vincenzo Ragusa, Conducente di Risciò,1883, terracotta
An artistic and at the same time love experience that emerges from the two terracotta works of 1883 kept at the GAM: one dedicated to his wife, the Portrait Eleonora O’Tama Kyohara Ragusa – portrayed with a realist trait of expressive Mediterranean sensuality – and the other of an elderly Rickshaw driver, with marked realism.
Vincenzo Ragusa, Ritratto di Eleonora O’Tama Ragusa,1883, terracotta