met the painters Yamamoto Hōsui and Fuji Masazō, as well as art dealer Tadamasa Hayashi, a specialist in ukiyo-e. All three urged the young student to turn to painting, saying that he could better help his country by learning to paint like a Westerner rather than learning law. Kuroda agreed, and began formally studying art at an art studio while simultaneously continuing his studies in law in an effort to please his adoptive father. This situation proved untenable, however, and Kuroda finally succeeded in convincing his father to allow him to abandon his legal studies and study painting full time. In May 1886, Kuroda entered the studio of Raphaël Collin, a noted Academic painter who had shown work in several Paris Salons. Kuroda also received guidance from Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, who influenced Kuroda's later use of the human body to represent abstract concepts. In 1886, Kuroda met another young Japanese painter, Kume Keiichiro, newly arrived in France, who also joined Collin's studio. The two became friends, and soon became roommates as well. It was during these years that he began to mature as a painter, first following the traditional course of study in Academic studio art before eventually also encountering plein-air painting. In 1890 Kuroda moved from Paris to the village of Grez-sur-Loing, an artists' colony about 70 kilometers south of Paris which had been formed by painters from the United States and from northern Europe. It was at Grez-sur-Loing that Kuroda first began to experiment with plein-air techniques, discovering inspiration in the rural landscape, as well as a young woman, Maria Billault, who became one of his favorite models. In 1893, Kuroda returned to Paris and began work on his most important painting to date, Morning Toilette, which would later become the first nude painting to be publicly exhibited in Japan. This large-scale work, which was destroyed in World War II, was accepted with great praise by the Académie des Beaux-Arts; Kuroda intended to bring it with him to Japan to shatter the Japanese prejudice against the depiction of the nude figure. With the painting in hand, he set out for home via the United States, arriving in July 1893. Back in Japan Having spent many long years of study in France to gain mastery of Western-style painting, Kuroda was eager to try out his newfound skills on the landscapes of his home country. Soon after arriving back