Sakamoto Yoshinobu (1895-1988)

Born in Kubokawa in Kochi Prefecture (Shikoku), Sakamoto Yoshinobu (坂本義信) graduated as a teacher in 1917. After seven years' service he went to Tokyo to study at the Taiheiyo-Gakai (Pacific Painting Association) under Ishikawa Toraji (q.v.) who also came from Kochi and who was experimenting with woodblock printing about that time. He returned to Kochi and became a drawing teacher. With the encouragement of a local patron, Admiral Yamauchi, he undertook the series 'Thirty Pictures of Tosa' (土佐三十絵図) from 1932 onwards. After the Pacific War he was visited in his atelier by various Westerners, and as a result ten sets of the series went abroad. Sakamoto also produced other landscapes and still lifes in the print medium.