Seiyō Ogawa

After graduating from primary school in Himeji, he moved to the house of his mother's cousin, Hino Yūzō, who operated a photo studio in the town Arima.

After serving in the army, he started entering the Bun-ten (文展) Exhibition which was held by the Ministry of Education and Culture.

He worked at the head office in Osaka and moved to Nara Prefecture, where he took courses in the photography of Buddhist sculptures and other cultural properties.

In 1922, Ogawa quit Asahi and opened a photo studio named Asuka-en (飛鳥園) in Nara, under the suggestion of the renowned art historian Aizu Yaichi who taught at Waseda University in Tokyo.

He took photographs of Buddhist sculptures at the old temples in Nara and Kyoto, as well as of ruins in foreign countries, such as the Yungang Grottoes in China; Angkor Wat in Cambodia; and Borobudur and Candi Prambananin in Central Java.