山崎 隆夫 Takao YAMAZAKI 雪の朝

山崎隆夫（1905〜1991）は、絵画と広告という2つの軸で活躍した洋画家です。

山崎は1905年に大阪で生まれ、幼少期から神戸で暮らしました。神戸高等商業学校（現在の神戸大学）在学中に、後に版画家となる前田藤四郎や画家の井上覺造らとともに美術グループ「青猫社」を結成します。同時期、洋画家・小出楢重に師事し、卒業後は三和銀行に勤めながら画業を続けました。小出の没後は林重義に師事しています。

戦後は芦屋市美術協会や現代美術懇談会（ゲンビ）に参加し、前衛的な表現を模索する一方、三和銀行の広報担当に抜擢されます。山崎は芸術家仲間の吉原治良や菅井汲、さらに当時アルバイトだった柳原良平のイラスト、人気女優のポートレートなどを起用し、広告デザインに革新をもたらしました。この手腕が寿屋（現在のサントリーホールディングス）の佐治敬三専務の目に留まり、1954年に柳原を伴って寿屋へ転籍し、宣伝部長に就任します。寿屋ではトリスウイスキーの広告やPR誌『洋酒天国』を発行するなど、積極的な広告活動を展開しました。

広告ビジネスの前線で多忙を極めるなかでも、山崎は画家としての歩みを止めませんでした。抽象画『卓上の弁証法』（1957年）に代表されるような、直線と曲線による幾何学的な構成へと画風を展開していきます。1962年には神奈川県茅ヶ崎市に居を構え、1970年代以降は『天地の分かれ』や『凱風』、そして『楷書富士図（紅・白）』（1976年）など、富士を題材とした作品群を制作します。いずれも、自然を極限まで簡潔な形と色彩でとらえた作品として知られています。

Takao YAMAZAKI (1905–1991) was a Western-style painter active along two axes: painting and advertising.

Yamazaki was born in Osaka in 1905 and grew up in Kobe from childhood. While enrolled at the Kobe Higher Commercial School (now Kobe University), he formed the art group Seibyo-sha with classmates including Toshiro MAEDA, who later became a printmaker, and the painter Kakuzo INOUE. During the same period, he studied with the Western-style painter Narashige KOIDE. After graduation, he continued to paint while working at Sanwa Bank. Following Oide's death, he studied with Shigeyoshi HAYASHI.

After World War II, he took part in the Ashiya City Art Association and the Contemporary Art Discussion Group (Genbi), exploring avant-garde expression, while also being appointed to handle public relations for Sanwa Bank. Yamazaki brought innovation to advertising design by drawing on the work of fellow artists such as Jiro YOSHIHARA and Kumi SUGAI, illustrations by Ryohei YANAGIHARA, who was then working part-time, and portraits of popular actresses. This skill came to the attention of Keizo SAJI, executive director of Kotobukiya (now Suntory Holdings), and in 1954 Yamazaki moved to Kotobukiya with Yanagihara and became director of the publicity department. At Kotobukiya, he pursued active advertising campaigns, including promotions for Torys whisky and the PR magazine Yoshu Tengoku (Paradise of Western Liquor).

Even while extremely busy on the front lines of the advertising business, Yamazaki did not stop moving forward as a painter. His style developed toward geometric compositions of straight and curved lines, as seen in the abstract painting "Dialectics on a Table" (1957). In 1962 he made his home in Chigasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture, and from the 1970s onward he produced a body of works on the theme of Mount Fuji, including "Where Heaven and Earth Part," "Fine Breeze," and "Calligraphic Fuji (Red and White)" (1976). Each is known as a work that captures nature in forms and colors reduced to the utmost simplicity.