BIZEN中南美美術館

BIZEN Museum of Latin American and American Art is a private art museum located in Hinase-cho, Bizen City, Okayama Prefecture. It opened as the Morishita Museum of Art Foundation in March 1975, and was renamed to its current name in 2005. It is the only archaeological museum in Japan that specializes in Central and South America. This page also mentions the foundation of the Morishita Group (Morishita Seirisho, Morishita Chemical Industries, etc.) and its founders. == Morishita Group == Seiichi Morishita was born in October 1904 in Hinase Village, Wake District, Okayama Prefecture (currently Hinase Town, Bizen City). His father sells miscellaneous goods and manufactures fishing nets, and after Seiichi graduates from upper elementary school, he and his father help sell fishing nets in Kansai and Kyushu. In 1929 (Showa 4), when he was 25 years old, he succeeded his father and became independent. After becoming the exclusive distributor of ramie for fishing nets from Toyo Hemp Spinning (later Toyo Senki, now Tosco), the company expanded its sales channels from western Japan to the Korean peninsula, and had an 80% market share of ramie for fishing nets. During the Pacific War, the company also produced camouflage nets to cover cannons and tanks, and after the war, expanded its manufacturing capacity by introducing power knitting machines. In 1947 (Showa 22), Morishita Screenworks Ltd. was established.