Yonekura Masakane was born in Fukuoka on July 10th 1934. He studied at the Sinan Gakuin University, and in 1957 he became actor and later director of the Mingei Theatre group, from which he retired in 2000. He is a multi-talent: he has been active as a film director, a movie actor, a woodblock print artist and as a children's book illustrator. In 1976 he won an important prize at the Bologna International Children's Book Fair. His woodblock prints mainly depict bijin-ga in his own, very personal style.
