Domoto Insho was born in Kyoto amongst a family of artists and connoisseurs. He graduated from the Kyoto Municipal School of Fine Arts and Crafts and studied under Nishiyama Shuisho (1879-1958), exhibiting works at government exhibitions and with the Nitten. He was the winner of the Imperial Fine Arts Academy Prize in 1925 and visited Europe in 1952. He was a member of the Japan Art Academy and received the Order of Cultural Merit in 1961. His nephew, Domoto Hisao (1928-2013), was at the forefront of abstract art, becoming involved with the Art Informel movement; a group of European artists with concerns similar to those of the Gutai in Japan, namely a conviction that in painting the substance and physicality of paint itself conveys energy and meaning.