The simplest prints were made from ink monochrome drawings, on which the artist sometimes noted suggestions for colour. The design was transferred by a skilled carver to acherry or boxwood block and carved in relief. A printer made impressions on paper from the inked block, and the individual prints could then be hand-coloured if desired. Printingin multiple colours required more blocks and a precise printing method so that registration would match exactly from block to block. Additional flourishes such as theuse of mica, precious metals, and embossing further complicated the task. Thus, while the themes and images of the floating world varied little whether in painting or print, the production method for prints involved many more anonymous and critical talents than those of the artist-designer whose name was usually printed on the single sheet, and the mass-produced prints were considered relatively disposable despite the high level of artistry that was frequently achieved. Nevertheless, with the exponentialincrease in literacy in the early Edo period and with the vast new patronage for images of the floating world—a clientele and subject matter not previously serviced by any of the traditional ateliers—mass production was necessary, and new schools and new techniques responded to the market. At the close of the 18th century, a palpable tightening of government censorship control and perhaps a shift in public interest from the intense introspection provided by artists ofthe demimonde forced publishers to search for other subject matter. Landscape became a theme of increasing interest. In Edo the artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760–1849), who as a young man trained with Katsukawa Shunsho-, broke with the atelier system and experimented successfully with new subjects and styles. In the 1820s and ’30s, when he was already a man of some age, Hokusai created the hugely popular print series Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji. Ando- Hiroshige (1797–1858) followed with another landscape-travelogue series, Fifty-three Stations of the To-kaido-, which offered scenes of the towns and way stations on the central highway connecting Edo and Kyo-to. Both these and other artists capitalized on public interest in scenes of distant places. These landscape prints in some way assuaged the restrictive travel codes enforced by the shogunate and allowed viewers imaginative journeys. Hokusai was also an important painter. His energetic rendering of the Thunder God is a fine example of the quirky and amusing quality of his figural painting. A characteristic swiftly modulating brush defines the figure, and light cast from an unseen source, perhaps lightning, allows for a play of light and shadow over the figure to model a sense of body volume. All the more remarkable is the fact that Hokusai wasin his 88th year when he painted this vigorous work. The depiction of famous views allowed for their idealization and also for important experiments with composition. Fragmentary foreground elements were used effectively to frame a distant view, a point of view adopted by some European painters after their study of 19th-century Japanese prints. Ironically, in their return to landscape and flora and fauna subjects, Japanese print arts revived the metaphoric vehicles of personal expression so familiar to the classic Japanese and Chinese painting traditions.
[1]
http://poetry.rotten.com/pan-asian-kink/
[2]
http://www.japanese-shunga.com/
[3]
http://www.gregkucera.com/erotica.htm
