Collection: Kasamatsu Shirō

Kasamatsu Shirō (1898–1991) was a Japanese engraver and printmaker born in Tokyo. He apprenticed at age 13 to Kaburagi Kiyokata, a master of Bijin-ga. Shirō was trained in the Shin-Hanga and Sōsaku-Hanga styles of woodblock printing. His teacher gave him the pseudonym Shiro, which he used as a signature mark.

While his teacher specialized in Bijin-ga, Kasamatsu developed an interest in landscape. He completed his first woodblock prints in 1919 for publisher Shōzaburō Watanabe, though many were destroyed in the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. By the late 1940s, Watanabe had published around 50 of his prints. From the 1950s, Kasamatsu partnered with Unsodo in Kyoto, producing over 100 prints by 1960. He also began to print and publish independently in the Sōsaku-Hanga style, creating nearly 80 such prints between 1955 and 1965.