Shiro Kasamatsu (笠松 紫浪, Kasamatsu Shirō, 11 January 1898, Tokyo – 14 June 1991) was a Japanese engraver and print maker trained in the
Shin-Hanga and
Sōsaku-Hanga styles of
woodblock printing.
Kasamatsu was born in Tokyo in 1898 and apprenticed at the age of 13 to
Kaburagi Kiyokata (1878–1973), a traditional master of Bijin-ga, pictures of beautiful women. Kasamatsu however took an interest in landscape and was given the pseudonym Shiro by his teacher, which he used as a signature mark in his prints.[2] Kasamatsu made woodblock prints for the publisher
Shōzaburō Watanabe from 1919. Almost all the woodblocks were destroyed in a fire in Watanabe's print shop following the
Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. Around 50 prints were published by Watanabe by the late 1940s.[3] Kasamatsu began to partner with
Unsodo in Kyoto from the 1950s and produced over 100 prints by 1960.[4] He also began to print and publish on his own in the
Sōsaku-Hanga style. He produced nearly 80
Sōsaku-Hanga prints between 1955 and 1965.[5][6]
The edge of Shinobazu pond during a foggy evening, 1932