Tatsumi (1907 - 1980 )
Born in Takasaki, Gunma as Sentaro Shimura, Tatsumi Shimura began his career in 1924 as an apprentice to Shuho Yamakawa. Like many artists at the time, Tatsumi worked as an illustrator for magazines, book covers, and newspapers in addition to his career as a painter. While he built his reputation as artist through his bijin-ga paintings, Tatsumi released woodblocks prints with the publisher Junzo Kato between 1948 and 1952. Tatsumi turned away from printmaking at the age of 60, devoting his time to nihonga painting. Professionally, he served as both director and chairman of the Shuppan Bijutsuka Renmei (Union of the Artists and Publications).
Shin Hanga | Pre-WWII Japanese Prints
By the beginning of the 20th century the social fabric of Japan was radically altered and ukiyo-e was falling fast into oblivion. Surprisingly, it was under the stimulus of the Western art world that the spirit of ukiyo-e was reborn through the Shin Hanga or “new print” movement. The discovery of the powerful impact of ukiyo-e print masters on the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists inspired a new generation of Japanese print artists who revived distinctly Japanese subject matter through modern eyes. International excitement for ukiyo-e paved the way for these artists to create woodblock prints with the same dignity, perfection and genius as the masters of the Edo period. As artists such as Goyo, Kotondo and Shinsui revived bijin-ga (pictures of beautiful women) and Hasui and Yoshida reinterpreted the landscape of Japan, Shin Hanga reasserted the principal genres of ukiyo-e with a renewed vigor. Browse our collection of Shin Hanga and other pre-war Japanese artworks today.
