Takahashi Shōtei
# Takahashi Shōtei

Takahashi Shōtei (高橋松亭), born Hiroaki (1871 – 11 February 1945) was a 20th-century Japanese woodblock artist in the shinsaku-hanga and later shin-hanga art movements.

## Biography

Hiroaki Takahashi was born in Tokyo, Japan, in 1871. As a young artist he was given the artistic name Shotei by his uncle, Matsumoto Fuko, under whose tutelage he was apprenticing. When he was 16 years old, he started a job with the Imperial Household Department of Foreign Affairs, where he copied the designs of foreign ceremonial objects. As with many Japanese woodblock artists over his lifetime he signed his work with various names and worked for several publishing companies. After studying art, Shotei and Terazaki Kogyo founded the Japan Youth Painting Society in 1889. In 1907, as a successful artist, he was recruited by Watanabe Shōzaburō to contribute shinsaku-hanga (souvenir prints) in Japan. Watanabe helped to fulfill the Western demand for newly-styled ukiyo-e woodblock prints which would be similar to familiar historical masters of that genre, especially Hiroshige. In about 1921 Shotei added the artistic name of Hiroaki. In 1923 the Great Kanto earthquake (and subsequent fire) destroyed Watanabe's facilities; this included all woodblocks. Thus, Shotei recreated prior designs destroyed in the Great Kanto earthquake and produced new woodblocks in the shin-hanga style. Shotei died of pneumonia on February 11, 1945. There is a persistent rumor that he died in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima but this is incorrect.

His works are held in the permanent collections of many museums worldwide, including the British Museum, the Princeton University Art Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, the University of Michigan Museum of Art, the National Museum of Asian Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Arizona State University Art Museum, the Brunnier Art Museum, the Honolulu Museum of Art, and the Saint Louis Art Museum.

