"This is a 50-year-old story," Yuji Abe said.
In fact, this story is older. It goes back to his grandfather's lifetime during the Meiji Era. Abe, however, refers to the years soon after the end of World War II, when he was still a young man and casting around for his way ahead. That was when he opened the Yoseido Gallery. He is 80 now, and happy to have his wife and daughter with him in the gallery. He is happy with his sons, one an entrepreneur, the other an actor. Family is his keynote.
Born in Tokyo, he went to Kyoto before the war to study kakemono making. He said: "Everyone knows me now as an art dealer, but I had the family business of kakemono binding, mounting, restoring. My grandfather was a great person, the best Meiji period kakemono maker. He followed his craft in this same Ginza location. He had contact with the Imperial family. Our family was very conservative. Everyone was a craftsman. I have craftsman's blood. I am no good in business."