A cache of figurative drawings by Matsumi Kanemitsu are among the hidden treasures in the Baltimore Museum of Art’s collection of prints, drawings and photographs. Gifted by dedicated Baltimore collector J. Blankfard Martenet, these works offer a remarkable deep dive into the practice of one of the most talented, though understudied, draftsmen of the 20th century.

Often dismissed as a second-generation Abstract Expressionist, Kanemitsu was in fact a highly original artist. Born in the United States, he spent the majority of his childhood in Japan before returning to America on the eve of World War II. Despite enlisting in the U.S. Army, Kanemitsu was arrested after the attack on Pearl Harbor and treated as an enemy combatant by the U.S. military. It was during his internment that he began making art using materials provided by the Red Cross.

After completing his tour of service in Europe, Kanemitsu moved to Baltimore, where he worked as a carpenter for Bethlehem Steel and began pursuing art as a full-time vocation. His first museum exhibition was held at the Baltimore Museum of Art in 1954. Kanemitsu would go on to live and study in New York at the Art Students League before eventually moving to Los Angeles and establishing an influential teaching career at Otis College of Art and Design and the California Institute of the Arts.

Kanemitsu became known as a prolific painter and printmaker, and the early, largely figurative works in the BMA’s collection constitute the only major record of his early, seminal experimentation with drawing. They demonstrate Kanemitsu’s natural talent and ability to seamlessly synthesize Eastern and Western visual idioms—while offering intimate glimpses of the daily life and artistic struggles of an emerging talent.