In 1905, at sixteen, he entered the school of the Japanese-style painter Hanko Kajita and was taught by Kokei Kobayashi, the senior pupil. He took the art name Togyu. In 1927, at thirty-eight, “Cucumber Field” was selected for the fourteenth Inten at his first attempt, and he was selected repeatedly thereafter; in 1932 he became a member of the Japan Art Institute. The name “Togyu” was taken by his father, a publisher, from the poems of Hanshan. His manner is marked by a pale, clear tone and a refined composition, produced by laying gofun and other pigments hundreds of times with a brush. He received the Order of Culture in 1962.