Kokei Kobayashi (小林古径) Kokei Kobayashi (小林古径), born February 11, 1883, in Niigata Prefecture, Japan, was a pivotal figure in the Nihonga movement—a distinctly Japanese style of painting that flourished between 1910 and 1945. His artistic journey began amidst considerable hardship; orphaned at a young age, he relocated to Tokyo at seventeen, embarking on his formal training under the guidance of Kajita Hanko (1870–1917), a renowned ins…