Mary Jo Putney

Mary Jo Putney

Patricia Rice

Patricia Rice

Susan Fraser King

Susan Fraser King

Anne Gracie

Anne Gracie

Nicola Cornick

Nicola Cornick

Andrea Penrose

Andrea Penrose

Christina Courtenay

Christina Courtenay

woodblock prints

Hiroshige – Japanese Print Artist

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Evening View of the Eight Scenic Spots of Kanazawa in Musashi Province, 1857

Christina here. I’ve blogged before about my great love of Japanese prints, notably in my post about the artist Hokusai (here). During my recent visit to Japan I couldn’t resist buying some more and I ended up with a beautiful triptych in gorgeous blue colours, as well as a modern reproduction of a cherry blossom print. Both of these were by an artist called Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), and imagine my surprise when I got home and found that the British Museum in London was putting on an exhibition of his work! Of course I had to go and see that (and they had the originals of both my prints which was lovely).

Memorial portrait of Hiroshige published after his death

Hiroshige was born in Edo (present-day Tokyo) during the Edo period (1615-1868) when Japan had an emperor but was ruled by the Tokugawa shogun and a samurai government. Edo was a huge city with a population of over one million already by the year 1700. Hiroshige’s family was classed as low-ranking samurai (warrior) and his father was a fire warden in the city. He became an orphan at 12 and despite his young age he inherited his father’s title and position.

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Hokusai and Japanese Woodblock Prints

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Hokusai booksChristina here. Ever since I lived in Japan, I’ve been drawn to Japanese woodblock prints. They are both simple and beautiful, and the variety of subjects is endless. Mostly they depict nature and/or people and places, and one of the absolute masters of this art was Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849). I think most people are familiar with his most famous print known as The Great Wave, which was actually entitled Under the Wave off Kanagawa. I love how he managed to create such wonderful scenes with just a few brushstrokes and his prints really show the Japanese way of life as it was back then.

HokusaiHe is mostly known for his landscape prints and paintings, but he was also the most amazing illustrator for various types of books. Recently, I was fortunate enough to attend an exhibition at the British Museum in London of some of his preliminary sketches and drawings for one such, a sort of picture encyclopedia that was going to be called The Great Picture Book of Everything. It was extremely interesting to see how he’d gone about creating the prints and where he got his ideas from. Most of the drawings were quite tiny and a little dark, but all were exquisite and showed his sense of humour and incredible imagination.

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