Oda Kazuma was a Japanese woodblock print artist and painter celebrated for his evocative landscapes and urban scenes, which capture the atmosphere of Meiji and Taisho-period Japan with sensitivity and technical refinement. His work occupies a distinctive place in the Shin-hanga and Sosaku Hanga movements for its combination of traditional Japanese compositional values with a keen awareness of Western artistic technique.
Born in Osaka in 1882, Oda trained initially as a lithographer and then yoga style painter before turning his attention to woodblock printmaking, producing print designs for Watanabe Shozaburo throughout the 1920s. His prints are admired for their treatment of weather — snow, rain, mist, and fading autumn light — rendered in a manner that draws on both the ukiyo-e tradition and the influence of Western Impressionism.