Japanese Woodblock Prints (1800 - 1868)
By the 19th century, Japanese woodblock prints achieved extraordinary popularity. While the shogunate issued a battery of censorship reforms throughout the 1800s, artists ignored and evaded restrictions with images of indulgent beauties and vibrant kabuki actors. As constraints tightened in the 1840s, bijin-ga (pictures of beautiful women) became earthier in prints by Eizan and Eisen, while kabuki actors persevered in the work of Kunisada (aka Toyokuni III). During this period, ukiyo-e artists also added landscapes, warriors, ghosts and scenes of everyday life to their oeuvre. Artists such as Hokusai and Hiroshige indulged a national wanderlust through Meisho-e or “famous place pictures,” while Kuniyoshi championed musha-e, a genre of warrior and legendary pictures.
220 Products
Kunisada
Memorial Portrait of Sumo Wrestler Hidoshi Rikiya II (1799-1836) Defeating the King of Hell and Two Demons
JP-94573
Toyokuni III
Poem by Chunagon Yakamochi: Kabuki Actor Segawa Kikunojo as Fox Tadanobu
JPR1-70990
Kuniyoshi
Poet Fujiwara no Okikaze: Higuchi Jiro Kanemitsu
JPR-87364
Toyokuni I
Kabuki Actor Ichikawa Omezo as Watanabe no Tsuna and Onoe Matsusuke as the Spirit of Earth Spider
JPR-109888
Toyokuni III
Kabuki Actor Nakamura Shikan IV as Otokodate Yami no Yoichiro
JP-94588