Hasegawa, born 1891 in Yokohama, was the eldest son of the banker Hasegawa Kazuhiko. Hasegawa grew up in wealthy circumstances, but lost his father early in 1902, as well as his mother Yoshiko soon after, while he was still enrolled at Azabu Middle School in central Tokyo. After graduating from Azabu Middle School, Hasegawa enrolled at Aoibashi Academy for Western-style Painting to study sketching with Kuroda Seiki, at the same time attending classes on oil painting at Hongo Academy under Saburosuke Okada and Takeji Fujishima. He furthermore was taught etching by Bernard Leach. In 1913, Hasegawa participated in the art journal “Kamen” (Mask), for which he produced woodblock printed cover art and illustrations. In 1918, he moved to France.

Hasegawa’s devotion to print making soon garnered him a spot in the Salon d’Automne, held in Paris, followed by his first solo exhibition of woodblock prints in 1925. His admission as a member of the Salon d’Automne in the following year confirmed his rising reputation in the Parisian art world of the mid-1920s. While after the outbreak of the Second World War many foreign artists chose to return to their home countries, Hasegawa opted to stay in France. Though this decision caused him hardship for his continuing life in Paris, he stayed active as an artist, particularly working in copperplate technique, and mezzotint, an art form Hasegawa helped to revive. He in fact never returned to Japan but died at his home in Paris in 1980, aged 89.