Hasegawa Tohaku was born in 1539 in Nanao, a town in Noto Province (in the vicinity of present-day Ishikawa Prefecture) to a noted local family of cloth dyers, although evidence shows that Tohaku's original family name was Okumura and that he was adopted into the Hasegawa family. Tohaku started his artistic career as a painter of Buddhist paintings in his home province of Noto. By the age of 20 Tohaku was a professional painter, and by his thirties he had moved to Kyoto to study under the prestigious Kano school, then headed by Kano Shoei. The Kano school was well known at the time for their large bold paintings that decorated the castle walls of many a wealthy warlord patron. These were often ink on white paper or gold-leaf decorative wall panels that served a dual purpose of reflecting light around the dim castle rooms as well as flaunting the castle owner's abundant wealth to commission such extravagant pieces. Many of Tohaku's earlier works are in the style of the Kano school, such as his Maple, Chishaku-in painted in 1593.