Born in the Nihonbashi district of Tokyo, Saito Akira, later known as Torii, Kotondo (Tori VIII) (1900-1976) was a shin hanga style print artist specializing in Kabuki actor portraits and bijin-ga. The only son of five children, he was adopted at the age of fifteen into the Torii family as the son of artist Torii Kiyotada (Torii VII). Torii began studying painting techniques in 1914 with the yamato-e painter Kobori Tomone. Four years later, he entered into the ateliers of Kiyokata Kaburagi and subsequently worked as a designer of Kabuki posters, programs, and billboards as a member of the Torii family. Torii also produced a variety of woodcuts and illustrations for Entertainment Illustrated Magazine. 

Beginning in 1925, he began exhibiting bijin-ga at the Inten exhibition and designed a small output of mokuhanga between 1927–1935. Because of his increasing success, he was featured at both Toledo Exhibitions (1930 and 1936), which put him in an international spotlight. Torii produced a total of twenty-three prints during his career, although some impressions have variant editions. Furthermore, his career was unique in that he was one of few shin hanga artists who did not work directly with publisher Watanabe Shozaburo; rather, his prints produced throughout the 1920s were published by Sakai-Kawaguchi, and by Ikeda the following decade. 

In 1935, Torii changed his art name to Kiyokoto, however upon his father's death in 1941 assumed the title of Torii VIII. After retiring from printmaking, he did set designs for Kabuki plays, was an art consultant for film and television programs, and served as a lecturer at Nihon University from 1966 to 1972 until his death four years later in 1976.