Ito Shinsui
100 Figures of Beauties Wearing Takasago Kimonos
Displayed below is a rare pre-war (circa 1931) print series of gorgeous 'bijin' (beautiful women) wearing Takasago-dyed kimonos, by the artist Ito Shinsui. Takasago dyeing is a special fabric dyeing process developed in Japan that dates to the 1600s. Prints from this series are machine printed or possibly lithographic items, and they are the finest examples of pre-war machine printing I've seen to date. According to a seal in the lower margin of each print they were printed using a patented "KI Banton" platemaking process, so probably an advanced technique for that era. Each scene is printed on washi paper (contains the usual chain lines) and without close inspection it is difficult to determine that these are not woodblock prints. Interestingly, it would appear that none of these scenes are copied from Shinsui's other works (woodblocks or paintings), so I assume that Shinsui composed these especially for this series. Each print is untitled, so where possible I've taken titles from similar woodblock print examples of Shinsui works.
None of the prints shown below are for sale, however, I have a small selection of Shinsui prints available here.
Ito Shinsui #1- Hanging Up A Lantern 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #2 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #3- Fireflies 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #4- Fireworks 100 Figures of Beauties
Ito Shinsui #5- After A Bath 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #6- Hanging Mosquito Net 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #7- Flowers 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #8- 100 Figures of Beauties
Ito Shinsui #9- Tanabata Festival 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #10- Summer 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #11- Behind the Screen 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #12- 100 Figures of Beauties
Ito Shinsui #13- Summer Fan 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #14- Summer Night 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #15- 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #16- Fireworks 100 Figures of Beauties
Ito Shinsui #17- Summer Flowers 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #18- Lady in Yukata With Fan 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #19- Contemplation 100 Figures of Beauties	Ito Shinsui #20- 100 Figures of Beauties
Ito Shinsui #0- Grace 100 Figures of Beauties

This series was published by Kisen-do of Suitengu-Mae, Tokyo (水天宮前喜扇堂発行) - the publisher information is written in blue in the lower left margin of each print. There was apparently two printing companies commissioned by Kisen-do to print this series:

(1) Toppan Printing Company Limited (凸版印刷株式會社), who have over a one hundred year printing history and are still in business with an Internet presence here. For this series they used a "Patented HB" printing process (特許HB製版印刷).

(2) Nissei Printing Company Limited (日清印刷株會社). I can't find any information on this company, from either English or Japanese sources. They used a "Patented KI Banton" printing process (特許KIバントン製版印刷).

Both the HB and KI Banton printing processes appear to have the same printing quality and are probably very similar processes.

This figure shows a comparison of the printing quality of this circa 1931 series that used the "KI Banton" printing process (left) with that of standard printing technology of the time (right). For comparison I'm using a print insert from the 1932 "Shufu No Tomo" magazine. A number of salient differences in the printing quality can be observed:

1. Dot size is far smaller (= finer printing quality) for the "KI Banton" printing process;
2. Dot spacing is slightly less (= finer printing quality) for the "KI Banton" printing process;
3. Most importantly, the "KI Banton" printing process is able to produce ink diffusion between the printing dots, which results in far finer graduations of colour intensity (= finer printing quality) when compared to standard printing techniques of the time that leave the space between ink dots 'uninked'.