Bakufu (1888 - 1976 )
Bakufu Ohno worked as a painter and woodblock printmaker in the first half of the 20th century. Born in Tokyo in 1888, Bakufu before moving to Kansai after the great earthquake of 1923. Though he was primarily a painter, he completed over seventy woodblock print designs during his lifetime. Kyoto Hanga-In published several of his series of fish designs. Bakufu set himself apart from his contemporaries in his style and diversity of genre. He is known for both his delicately composed and scientifically accurate studies of fish, as well as a number of highly accomplished landscape and nature studies.
Shin Hanga | Pre-WWII Japanese Prints
By the beginning of the 20th century the social fabric of Japan was radically altered and ukiyo-e was falling fast into oblivion. Surprisingly, it was under the stimulus of the Western art world that the spirit of ukiyo-e was reborn through the Shin Hanga or “new print” movement. The discovery of the powerful impact of ukiyo-e print masters on the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists inspired a new generation of Japanese print artists who revived distinctly Japanese subject matter through modern eyes. International excitement for ukiyo-e paved the way for these artists to create woodblock prints with the same dignity, perfection and genius as the masters of the Edo period. As artists such as Goyo, Kotondo and Shinsui revived bijin-ga (pictures of beautiful women) and Hasui and Yoshida reinterpreted the landscape of Japan, Shin Hanga reasserted the principal genres of ukiyo-e with a renewed vigor. Browse our collection of Shin Hanga and other pre-war Japanese artworks today.
