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May 27, 2024
Japanese Prints in Transition
Part 3 |
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From the Floating World to the Modern World
Featuring Western Ways -The Making of Modern Japan |
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The artworks featured in Japanese Prints in Transition: From the Floating World to the Modern World are seldom on view due to their extreme sensitivity to light. Drawn entirely from the collection of the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, these prints expressively describe a dynamic period of transition in Japanese history. The exhibition culminates with a selection of prints by the contemporary Japanese American artist Masami Teraoka (b. 1936), who grapples with American pop culture's widespread influence through the lens of ukiyo-e, demonstrating the enduring relevance of the woodblock-print medium. |
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Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892)
The Appearance of an Upper-Class Wife of the Meiji Era, from the series Thirty-Two Aspects of Customs and Manners, 1888
Color woodblock print with embossing and lacquer |
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Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915)
The Journalist Fukuchi Gen'ichiro, from the series Instruction in the Fundamentals of Success, 1885
Color woodblock print with traces of mica
Kobayashi Kiyochika's depiction of Fukuchi Gen'ichiro is the best-known image in the artist's series of twenty prints representing ideal male citizens. Fluent in English, a former bureaucrat, successful businessman, and chief editor and president of the Tokyo newspaper Tokyo Nichinichi Shinbun, the journalist was considered one of the most prominent figures of the Meiji era. He stands pen in hand, ready to report on the tumultuous Satsuma Rebellion (the final samurai uprising, which occurred in 1877) unfolding behind him. At his feet, a broken samurai sword foretells defeat. He was invited to present his coverage of the war directly to the emperor, an honor and privilege that brought the field of journalism newfound esteem in Japan.
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Detail of: The Journalist Fukuchi Gen'ichiro, from the series Instruction in the Fundamentals of Success, 1885 |
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Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839-1892)
Kuraso: The Appearance of a Wife during the Meiji Era, from the series Thirty-Two Aspects of Customs and Manners, 1889
Color woodblock print with burnishing |
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Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
The Emperor Meiji Leaving the Palace on the Occasion of His Marriage, 1889
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing and mica, with brush and black ink
In 1889, the Meiji government established a Western-inspired constitutional monarchy with a parliament called "the Diet" and an elected lower house. This print was originally designed to commemorate the celebrations for Japan's new constitution held on February 11, 1889. That afternoon, Emperor and Empress Meiji took part in a groundbreaking imperial procession, the first instance in Japan's history where they were observed riding together in the same carriage. This event underscored the empress's prominence and heralded a new era for Japanese women.
This print, however, is a later impression of this composition bearing an alternative title in the red cartouche in the upper right corner: The Emperor Meiji Leaving the Palace on the Occasion of His Marriage. To save money, publishers who owned woodblocks would occasionally repurpose them to honor another event, such as the imperial couple's twenty-fifth, or silver, wedding anniversary five years later in 1894.
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Detail of: The Emperor Meiji Leaving the Palace on the Occasion of His Marriage, 1889 |
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Detail of: The Emperor Meiji Leaving the Palace on the Occasion of His Marriage, 1889 |
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Detail of: The Emperor Meiji Leaving the Palace on the Occasion of His Marriage, 1889 |
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Utagawa Kunisada III (1848-1920)
Marionettes Imitating the Sound of a Bell Playing at Ichimura Theater, 1890
Color woodblock triptych print with lacquer and mica |
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Detail of: Marionettes Imitating the Sound of a Bell Playing at Ichimura Theater, 1890 |
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Kuniomi Uematsu (active 1895)
The Meiji Emperor's Victory Procession, 1895
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Detail of: The Meiji Emperor's Victory Procession, 1895 |
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Detail of: The Meiji Emperor's Victory Procession, 1895 |
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Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
A Military Parade at Aoyama, ca. 1890-1900
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing |
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Detail of: A Military Parade at Aoyama, ca. 1890-1900 |
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Detail of: A Military Parade at Aoyama, ca. 1890-1900 |
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Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
Plum Trees in Full Bloom, the Meiji Emperor, Empress, and Women of the Nobility, 1888
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing and mica |
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Detail of:
Plum Trees in Full Bloom, the Meiji Emperor, Empress, and Women of the Nobility, 1888 |
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Detail of:
Plum Trees in Full Bloom, the Meiji Emperor, Empress, and Women of the Nobility, 1888 |
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Detail of:
Plum Trees in Full Bloom, the Meiji Emperor, Empress, and Women of the Nobility, 1888 |
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Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
Imperial Party Visits the Park at Asuka, 1888
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing, lacquer, and traces of mica |
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Attributed to
Shötei Watanabe (1851-1918) and Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
The Seven Grasses of Autumn at the Hundred Flowers Garden,
19th-20th century
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Detail of: The Seven Grasses of Autumn at the Hundred Flowers Garden,
19th-20th century |
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Detail of: The Seven Grasses of Autumn at the Hundred Flowers Garden,
19th-20th century |
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Toyohara Kunichika (1835-1900)
Song Composed by the Empress,
1887
Color woodblock diptych print |
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Detail of: Song Composed by the Empress,
1887 |
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Yosh Chikanobu (1838-1912)
The Hall of Machinery at the Exhibition for the Promotion of Domestic Industry, 1877
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing
In the second half of the nineteenth century, a series of world's fairs was organized in Europe and the United States. These events were grand international exhibitions where nations presented their raw materials, cultural products, and latest innovations.
The Meiji government was eager to take part in these expositions in order to define the image of modern Japan on a global stage, doing so for the first time at the Vienna International Exposition of 1873.
Japan went on to host three domestic exhibitions of industry. In this print, a group of women demonstrate a novel silk-reeling machine while at the first Japanese National Industrial Exhibition, staged in Tokyo in 1877.
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Detail of: The Hall of Machinery at the Exhibition for the Promotion of Domestic Industry, 1877 |
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Detail of: The Hall of Machinery at the Exhibition for the Promotion of Domestic Industry, 1877 |
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A LANDSCAPE TRANSFORMED
TOKYO AND BEYOND
Kaika-e, or "enlightenment pictures," a subgenre of Meiji-era woodblock prints, document the rapid technological advancements that emerged during the period. Infrastructure and new modes of transportation, including railways, steam engines, train stations, bridges, and shipyards, quickly transformed Edo-period Tokyo into an innovative industrial center.
Printmaking similarly underwent an aesthetic transformation due to the influence of Western perspective and the importation of chemical aniline dyes, which expanded the ukiyo-e palette to include bold, saturated colors to match the nation's modern image. |
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Yoshu Chikanobu (1838-1912)
Untitled (A Mother Takes Her Son for a Walk during the Russo-Japanese War)
ca. 1904-1905
Color woodblock triptych print with embossing and burnishing |
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Detail of: Untitled (A Mother Takes Her Son for a Walk during the Russo-Japanese War)
ca. 1904-1905 |
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Detail of: Untitled (A Mother Takes Her Son for a Walk during the Russo-Japanese War)
ca. 1904-1905 |
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Utagawa Kokunimasa
(1874-1944)
Red Cross Field Hospital of Great Japan Treating the Wounded during the Russo-Japanese War, with inset vignette Barbarian Russian Soldiers, 1904
Color woodblock triptych print
The prolific Meiji-era artist Utagawa Kokunimasa introduced the popular subject of the Japanese Red Cross tending to wounded Chinese and Russian prisoners. The inset image near the top of this print depicts Russian soldiers tormenting two Japanese civilians. Such blatant propaganda characterized the Japanese military as humane, civil, and even chivalrous in comparison to their counterparts, helping support the government's political narrative. Overtly racist depictions of the Russian and Chinese "other" were common among wartime prints. |
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Detail of:
Red Cross Field Hospital of Great Japan Treating the Wounded during the Russo-Japanese War, with inset vignette Barbarian Russian Soldiers, 1904 |
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Detail of:
Red Cross Field Hospital of Great Japan Treating the Wounded during the Russo-Japanese War, with inset vignette Barbarian Russian Soldiers, 1904 |
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Detail of:
Red Cross Field Hospital of Great Japan Treating the Wounded during the Russo-Japanese War, with inset vignette Barbarian Russian Soldiers, 1904 |
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Detail of:
Red Cross Field Hospital of Great Japan Treating the Wounded during the Russo-Japanese War, with inset vignette Barbarian Russian Soldiers, 1904 |
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Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915)
Our Valiant Army Conquers an Island off Taiwan, 1894
Color woodblock triptych print with traces of mica
Kobayashi Kiyochika was acclaimed for his prints depicting the first Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895), and he designed approximately seventy triptychs over the war's brief ten-month period. Here, in a foreboding landscape, Japanese artillerymen gun down a group of Taiwanese soldiers in a battle over the island of Hökoto, located in an archipelago of ninety islands in the Taiwan Strait, which Japan hoped to colonize.
Kiyochika was known for his masterful use of light, which he deployed here to render the brilliant pink and orange flames that cast the shadows of the barely discernible fighting figures onto the water, so that the scene also unfolds as a reflection. His evocative compositions often blended the expressive power of the woodblock medium with horrific, at times even brutal, subjects, providing Japanese consumers aestheticized images of colonization and war.
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Detail of: Our Valiant Army Conquers an Island off Taiwan, 1894 |
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Migita Toshihide (1863-1925)
A Japanese Sailor Leaps on Board a Russian Warship and Kicks Its Captain Overboard, from the series Records of the Russo-Japanese War, 1904
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing and embossing
Photography was less expensive and more efficient to produce than woodblock prints, and by the 1890s, this relatively new medium had begun to overtake the historic printing tradition. Capturing battle scenes, however, posed significant challenges for photog-raphers: their equipment was heavy, and the medium required long exposure times and perfect timing to get the right shot, allowing woodblock printing a brief resurgence. Moreover, the artistic control inherent to woodblock printing was valuable to the Meiji govern-ment, who wanted to establish particular narratives through popular media.
In this tumultuous scene, a Japanese sailor kicks a Russian sea captain off the deck of his ship. Depicting billowing clouds of smoke framing the captain's body as it careens toward the crashing waves, Migita Toshihide has spun a moment of brutality into a romanticized display of bravado aligned with the government's propagandistic program.
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Detail of: A Japanese Sailor Leaps on Board a Russian Warship and Kicks Its Captain Overboard, from the series Records of the Russo-Japanese War, 1904 |
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Detail of: A Japanese Sailor Leaps on Board a Russian Warship and Kicks Its Captain Overboard, from the series Records of the Russo-Japanese War, 1904 |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
Train Station at Shimbashi
Color woodblock print
Selections from the series Thirty-Six Views of Modern Tokyo, 1874
Just as the early influx of Western visitors in Yokohama consumed artists' visual imaginations, so too did the rapid transformation of Tokyo's cityscape. In his Thirty-Six Views of Modern Tokyo, Utagawa Hiroshige III, a talented pupil of Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), provides glimpses of the city during this period of change. This selection of prints from the series describes horse-drawn carriages, a steam-powered paddleboat off the shore of Shinagawa, and the railway station at Shimbashi, a new addition to the revolutionary train line connecting Yokohama and Tokyo. Elsewhere, women wearing kimonos gather at Tokyo's Suitengu, a Shinto shrine dedicated to conception and safe childbirth, reminding viewers that aspects of traditional Japanese culture endured. |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
The Double Bridge (Spectacle Bridge) from Surugadai
Color woodblock print |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
Yanagi Bridge from Asakusa Bridge
Color woodblock print |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
The Sea off Shinagawa
Color woodblock print |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
Suiten Shrine at Kakigaracho
Color woodblock print |
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Utagawa Kunitoshi (active 1860-1890)
The National Diet Building of the Empire of Great Japan, 1889
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing
Japan's modern legislature, called the National Diet, was established in 188%. This print depicts the first National Diet building, which was completed in 1890. After multiple designs were considered, this structure was devised by Adolph Stegmueller from the German architectural firm Ende and Böckmann in collaboration with Japanese architect Yoshii Shigenori. The two-story, Western-style building lent authority to the new regime, which wanted to operate on the global stage. This rare image records the building's appearance before it burned down due to an electrical fire only two months later in January 1891.
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Detail of: The National Diet Building of the Empire of Great Japan, 1889
Color woodblock triptych print with burnishing
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Shösai Ikkei (active ca. 1870)
Steam Train at Takanawa in Tokyo, ca. 1872
Color woodblock triptych print
Establishing a transportation network was crucial for modernizing and ensuring the country's economic strength; railways were the most eagerly anticipated of Japan's new forms of transport. The Japanese government enlisted British engineer Edmund Morel (1840-1871) and a team of three hundred English and American advisers, builders, and civil engineers to construct the railway, with the understanding that the Westerners would teach and advise their Japanese counterparts to ensure Japan's eventual self-sufficiency. In 1872, Japan's first railway opened, connecting Yokohama's trade port with Tokyo, the new capital. Shösai Ikkei's design features a steam train arriving at Takanawa, a seaside stop along this route. |
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Detail of: Steam Train at Takanawa in Tokyo, ca. 1872
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Utagawa Hiroshige III (1843-1894)
Railroad along the Coast of Yokohama, 18/4
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Detail of: Railroad along the Coast of Yokohama, 18/4
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Detail of: Railroad along the Coast of Yokohama, 18/4
Color woodblock triptych print |
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Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915)
Fox and Crescent Moon, 1880
Color woodblock print |
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Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915)
Color woodblock print |
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Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847-1915)
The Kiinokuni Slope at Akasaka, from an untitled series of views of Tokyo, 1880
Color woodblock print |
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MASAMI TERAOKA
UKIYO-E POP
After playing a crucial part in Japan's transition into a global nation, woodblock prints were supplanted by the emergence of magazines, picture postcards, and, above all, photography. Nevertheless, the impact of ukiyo-e printmaking techniques and subject matter continues to resonate with contemporary artists and audiences.
Japan-born artist Masami Teraoka (b. 1936), who moved to the United States in 1961, employs humor, insight, and dynamism-qualities intrinsic to the attitude and aesthetic of the floating world-to critically examine society. His work boldly grapples with charged social and political subjects, including forthright depictions of sex, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the widespread impact of American culture. Using Edo-period motifs-such as courtesans, samurai, Kabuki actors, flowing waves, and elegant traditional textiles-Teraoka's work represents the collision of cultural influences that gave many woodblock prints their broad appeal. |
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Masami Teraoka
(American, b. Japan 1936)
31 Flavors Invading Japan/Cherry,
1978
Hand-printed relief print from a zinc key plate with hand coloring in watercolor |
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Masami Teraoka
(American, b. Japan 1936)
31 Flavors Invading Japan/Today's Special, 1977
Woodblock print from the key block |
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Detail of: 31 Flavors Invading Japan/Today's Special, 1977
Woodblock print from the key block |
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Masami Teraoka
(American, b. Japan 1936)
McDonald's Hamburgers InvadingJapan/Tattooed Woman andGeisha III, 2018
Woodblock print with forty-three colors |
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Detail of: McDonald's Hamburgers InvadingJapan/Tattooed Woman andGeisha III, 2018
Woodblock print with forty-three colors |
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Detail of: McDonald's Hamburgers InvadingJapan/Tattooed Woman andGeisha III, 2018
Woodblock print with forty-three colors |
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Masami Teraoka
31 Flavors Invading Japan/Today's Special, 1980-1982
Woodblock print with thirty-five colors and additional hand coloring
In this print, a woman indulges her sweet tooth, devouring a double-scoop chocolate chip ice cream as her kimono seductively slides down her shoulders.
Having moved to the United States in the midst of the postwar boom in consumerism, Masami Teraoka sensed the danger of the ballooning fast-food industry. Here, in the woman's frenzied expression, her snakelike tongue reaching for a stray drop, he criticizes popular ice cream chain Baskin-Robbins (alluded to in the work's title)-one of the many Western franchises that threatened native culinary traditions when introduced in Japan-as well as the greed such massive multinational companies inspire. |
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Masami Teraoka
(American, b. Japan 1936)
McDonald's Hamburgers Invading Japan/Chochin-me, 1982
Screenprint with thirty-six colors |
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Japanese Prints in Transition: From the Floating World to the Modern World
April 6 – August 18, 2024
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