Tatsumi Shimura1907~1980 志村立美

Shimura Tatsumi (February 17, 1907 – May 4, 1980) was a Japanese-style painter, illustrator, and bijin-ga (beautiful women) artist born in Takasaki, Gunma Prefecture. In 1924 he became a pupil of Yamakawa Shuho and trained in bijin-ga. Together with Iwata Sentaro and Kobayashi Hidetsune he was hailed as one of the “Three Crows” of the illustration world, gaining popularity for newspaper-serial illustrations of Hayashi Fubo’s “Tange Sazen” and frontispieces in magazines such as “Shufu no Tomo” and “Fujokai.” In his later years he stepped back from illustration to return to his roots in Japanese painting and bijin-ga, receiving the Japan Writers Club Prize in 1976 for his collection “Bijin Hyakutai.”