Japanese Prints

”We live only for the moment, in which we admire the splendor of the moonlight, the snow, the cherry blossom and the colours of the maple leaves. We enjoy the day, warmed by wine, without allowing the poverty which stares us in the face to restore our sobriety. In this drifting—like a pumpkin carried along by the current of the river—we do not allow ourselves to be discouraged for a moment. This is what is called the floating, fleeting world.”

Ukiyo-e, “pictures of the floating world”, is an artistic genre of Japanese woodblock prints emerged between the 17th and the 20th centuries. The favorite themes of ukiyo-e are landscapes, the theatre and pleasure quarters.

Ukiyo, meaning “floating world”, refers to the impetuous young culture that bloomed in the urban centers of Edo (modern-day Tokyo), Osaka, and Kyoto that were a world unto themselves. It is an ironic allusion to the homophone term “Sorrowful World”, the earthly plane of death and rebirth from which Buddhists sought release. The art form rose to great popularity in the metropolitan culture of Edo (Tokyo) during the second half of the 17th century, originating with the single-color works of Hishikawa Moronobu in the 1670s. At first, only India ink was used, then some prints were manually colored with a brush, but in the 18th century Suzuki Harunobu developed the technique of polychrome printing to produce nishiki-e.

Ukiyo-e were affordable because they could be mass-produced. They were meant for mainly townsmen, who were generally not wealthy enough to afford an original painting. The original subject of ukiyo-e was city life, in particular activities and scenes from the entertainment district. Beautiful courtesans, bulky sumo wrestlers and popular actors would be portrayed while engaged in appealing activities. Later on landscapes also became popular. Political subjects, and individuals above the lowest strata of society (courtesans, wrestlers and actors) were not sanctioned in these prints and very rarely appeared. Sex was not a sanctioned subject either, but continually appeared in ukiyo-e prints. Artists and publishers were sometimes punished for creating these sexually explicit shunga.