Kyūshū Mamehon 7, 1955

Kawakami Sumio 川上澄生 (1895–1972) 

A school teacher who made prints in his spare time, Kawakami lived for over 30 years in a small provincial city several hours north of Tokyo.  His career followed a highly individual path from the start.  After graduating from college, he spent a year in the United States, supporting himself with odd jobs that included house painting in Seattle and a stint in a fish cannery in Alaska.  Shortly after returning to Japan he accepted a teaching position in Utsunomiya, which he held for most of the remainder of his life.  Though he exhibited with the Japan Creative Society in the early twenties, he knew relatively few of the print artists and was never much influenced by them.

Kawakami was fascinated by the amusing encounters and bizarre misunderstanding that had occurred when the first foreigners arrived in Japan, and this interest is reflected in a great many of his prints.  

For more information on this artist see Kawakami Sumio 川上澄生 (1895–1972) 

Mutō Kan'ichi 武藤完一  (1892-1982) 

Born in Gifu City, Gifu Prefecture. He studied under the Western-style painter Takeji Fujishima 藤島武二 (1867-1943) at Kawabata School of Painting, graduating in 1915 and after a short course with Hiratsuka Un'ichi 平塚運一 (1895-1997) he began creating woodblock prints. He took part in the proletarian art movement, an international movement  seeking to remake art and literature in the context of class-based struggle. He was a founding member of the Japan Etching Society and received the Oita culture prize in 1950. In 1960, he founded the Nippankai 日版会 with Shikō Munakata 棟方志功  (1903-1975) and others and in 1964, he became a member of Kōfukai Art Association (Light and Wind Club).  

Sources: Japan Wikipedia; Guide to Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: 1900-1975, Helen Merritt, University of Hawaii Press, 1992, p. 159-160.

Sekino Juni'chirō 関野準一郎 (1914-1988) 

Sekino Juni'chirō is one of the major post-WWII figures in the sosaku hanga (creative print) movement.  He was born in Yasukata-cho, Amori Prefecture in northern Japan in 1914, the first son of Junzō Sekino who owned a wholesale fertilizer store.  From an early age Sekino displayed an artistic bent and a fascination with Japanese woodblock.   

While largely a self-taught artist, having closely studied available material on woodblock carving and printing while still young, he did study etching at Nishida Takeo’s Japanese Etching Institute and oil painting and drawing at a private painting school. In addition, starting in 1931, he studied intaglio printmaking and lithography with printmaker Kon Junzō (1893-1944), who considered Sekino "an artistic genius."

In 1981 he was awarded the Purple Medal Ribbon by the Japanese Government. The following year, he had a solo exhibition at Central Museum Tokyo and in 1987 he was award the 4th class medal by the Japanese government.  

For more information on this artist see Sekino Juni'chirō 関野準一郎 (1914-1988).