Arai Yoshimune (1863-1941), or Utagawa Yoshimune II, was the eleventh and youngest son of Utagawa Yoshimune I (1817-1880) and spent his childhood residence in the Kinroku-chō area of Tokyo. At a young age he studied with the famous ukiyo-e artist Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892) and he assumed the name Toshiyuki at age thirteen. After his father’s death he was adopted by the Arai family. He succeeded his father in 1882 to become Yoshimune II and occasionally used his father’s art name Isshōsai, along with the adopted name Arai Yoshimune. Arai worked primarily with the Hasegawa/Nishinomiya publishing house. By 1893, Arai was part of Hasegawa’s stable team along with Suzuki Kason and Mishima Shōsō. While he was a frequent collaborator on crepe-paper book illustration, he is also well known for his shin-hanga contributions to Hasegawa’s Night Scenes.