Unlike many artists now who praise technology and covet the artificial and unnatural, Keisei Kobayashi genuinely seeks a return to nature alone. In commenting on his prints he has said that modern civilisation, in going against the laws of nature, reminds him of the conceited creators of the tower of Babel; modern science aims at progress by defying nature but he seeks to follow the provisions of nature. Hence he uses wood to do his printing, reverting to wood-engraving, an unusual medium in modern Japan. As he applies his chisel to the wood, he loses himself in the rings of the boxwood which nature has taken hundreds of years to create, and then his work comes alive.

Kobayashi was born in Kyoto, educated at the International Art Institute there, and now lives in Tokyo.