Japanese artists in Paris who practiced Western-style painting were generally described by contemporary critics as simple copyists, or, in the words of André Warnod, "wanting to be European at all costs".Sophie Krebs, "À travers un cristal étrange. Foujita et la France", dans Foujita. Oeuvres d'une vie, exh. cat., Paris, Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris, 2019, p.36-49. Yet, Foujita was deemed the exception to this rule. Warnod states that Foujita "knew how to look with his own eyes and paint according to his temperament, without worrying too much about others": compared to other Japanese painters, Foujita was seen as having "personality". Art historian Asato Ikeda has recently argued that "in contrast to other Japanese artists in the city, Fujita [targeted] his paintings to French audiences by successfully negotiating the artistic heritage of his country and making something original from the perspective of European art history".Asato Ikeda, The Politics of Painting. Fascism and Japanese Art during the Second World War, Honolulu, University of Hawai'i Press, 2018.
