Description.

I am pleased to announce the release of a photo album of Master Shun Ikebukuro. I, Keiichi KUWAI, the author and photographer, first had the opportunity to meet Master Kakutoshi in 1995, and since then, I have been indebted to Master Kakutoshi for nearly 30 years, both publicly and privately. Since then, he has been a great help to me both publicly and privately for almost 30 years. Since he has always been a close friend of mine, I was allowed to bring my camera to his workshop and take many pictures. I was allowed to take many pictures of not only his completed works but also scenes of his daily work, some of which were taken while he was drinking, and some of which were taken during his band performances. At the beginning of the year 2023, I started to produce this book with a sense of mission to preserve in an official album the works of Master Kakutoshi, who deserves to be called a first-rate artist. At the same time, we felt strongly that we wanted to help people overseas better understand traditional and authentic Japanese tattoos. We have also incorporated another theme of the Japanese people's deep-rooted ideas and senses of "all things in the forest, the 8 million gods". We hope that you will take a look at the marvelous works of the first master carver, Mr. Shun.