CAT AND MOUSE (c.1870, by Kyosai Kawanabe)

CAT AND MOUSE (c.1870, by Kyosai Kawanabe)

     A humorous print by showing a cat holding aloft a rat by it’s tail with a sliver of moon just above them. Printed only in sumi and light brown. This print is considered quite rare and was published by Wawamuraya Seikichi in Tokyo.

     Kyosai Kawanabe (1831 - 1889), an extremely skillful artist who worked as a painter, print maker and illustrator, was born as the son of a samurai, and as a child, joined the school of Kuniyoshi Utagawa. During his career he was most noted for his prints with humorous and caricature-like subjects, although I have seen some very sensitive and skillful landscapes of his that I enjoyed very much. He is nicknamed the "comic genius"; some of his humor perhaps stemming from his strong liking for saké. He was also one of Japan’s first political caricaturists. His ability to perfectly portray attitudes through the posture and movements of the figures in his prints gained him a reputation for being one of the most individualistic artists of the Meiji period.

© 2018 by Hayato Tokugawa and the Kitty Mafia Art Worx™. All rights reserved.

MIZUDORI TO SAKANA-TACHI or WATERFOWL AND FISH by Asano Takeji

MIZUDORI TO SAKANA-TACHI or WATERFOWL AND FISH

by Asano Takeji

   Asano Takeji, born in Kyoto in 1900, began to study art as a youth and graduated from the Kyoto City School of Fine Arts and Crafts in 1919, and later from the Kyoto City Specialist School of Painting in 1923. One of his teachers was noted artist and printmaker Tsuchida Bakusen, who along with Asano helped to organize the Kyoto Creative Print Society (Kyoto Sosaku-hanga Kyoka) in 1929.

   The following year, Asano and some other members of the society contributed designs for a series of prints entitled “Creative Prints of Twelve Months in New Kyoto” (Sosaku-hanga shin Kyoto Junikagetsu), which were published by noted printer Uchida. As time went on, Asano extended his skills in print design, carving and printing; thus, enabling him to create both self-carved and self-printed landscape prints.

   In 1947, he created the series “Kinki Meisho Fukei” or “Famous Places in Kinki (the Kyoto-Osaka region), displaying a high level of technical skill. His fame continued to grow through the 1950s with  the series “Kinki Hakkei,” (Eight Views of Kinki), and the series “Tokyuo Meisho” or “Famous Places of Tokyo – all self-carved and self-printed.

   Asano died in 1999 at the young age of 99.

   This particular print, “Mizudori to Sakana-tachi” or “Waterfowl and Fish,” dated 1976, is very indicative of his Shin-hanga style – bold, humorous, semi-abstract.

KABUKI JU-HACHI BAN - SUKEROKU byTadamasa Ueno (1904 - 1970)

KABUKI JU-HACHI BAN - SUKEROKU (First Edition)

By Tadamasa Ueno (1904 - 1970)

Tadamasa Ueno is most noted for his dramatic kabuki actor prints, many of which bear a resemblance to the highly stylized figures of ukiyo-e. Born Ueno Kitsumi, he studied from an early age with Torii Kiyotada (Torii VII); the Torii family representing a long line of artists closely associated with the kabuki theater and with printmaking as far back as the 17th century. Another member of the famous Torii family, Torii Kotondo, was designing prints around the same time. As was traditional among many ukiyo-e artists, his artist name Tadamasa was partially derived from his teacher's name, both containing the syllable tada.

In 1940, Tadamasa met Watanabe Shozaburo to discuss publishing woodblock prints based on his kabuki paintings; a meeting which resulted in a collaboration on two series of actor prints. The first series titled Eighteen Kabuki Makeups (Kabuki kumadori juhachi ban) was published duringfrom 1940 to 1941, with one print being released each month. An additional print, New Year’s Fortune Sanbaso Makeup, was included with this series. All of these prints were signed with the Tadamasa signature, but with a variety of different seals.

After the first series was completed, Watanabe began publishing a second series of kabuki makeup (Zoku kumadori juhachi ban), but was forced to abandon work due to war shortages. Only seven prints in this series were ever completed. After World War II, Tadamasa continued to work as a kabuki artist designing billboards for the theater in Tokyo. In 1949, he was accepted as a member of the Torii family and granted the name Torii Tadamasa.

During the early 1950s, Tadamasa worked on several series of kabuki prints with the publishers Shokokusha and Dairesha. With Shokokusha, he designed a 12 print kabuki calendar series as well as a series of 18 kabuki prints (Kabuki juhachi ban). These prints were carved by Okura Hanbei and Nagashima Michio, and printed by Shinmi Saburo. With the publisher Dairesha, Tadamasa designed another series of 18 kabuki prints titled One of Eighteen Kabuki Plays (Kabuki juhachi ban no uchi). This series was carved by Maeda Kentaro and printed by Ono Hikojiro.

This particular print dted 1952, is from on of the kabuki dynasty, Ichikawa family's 18 famous plays. "Sukeroku". Swashbuckling hero, Sukeroku.

DIVAN JAPONAIS - TOULOUSE-LAUTREC by Gihachiro Okuyama (1907-1981)

DIVAN JAPONAIS - TOULOUSE-LAUTREC

By Gihachiro Okuyama (1907-1981)

Born in 1907, OKUYAMA GIHACHIRO studied art under Kasaka Gajin and during the very tough economic times of the 1920s, primarily making a living designing posters and advertising labels eventually for commercial companies. In 1931, he had built up a sufficient reputation and enough money to establish his own advertising company; yet all the while,  very active in both Japan's Sosaka and Shin Hanga art print moments, creating woodblocks which were exhibited in within these organizations. Following WW II, in 1946 he established the Japan Print Institute or Nihon Hanga Kenkyusho, and continued to work as a woodblock artist for most of his life. His prints display a fine and creative style and they are among the rarest of Shin Hanga woodblocks to be found today.

In this print, Divan Japonais - Toulouse-Lautrec, dated 1956, Okuyama again pays tribute to Toulouse-Lautrec in an interpretive reproduction of a famous print of May Belfort, an English singer who became famous on the stages of Parisian nightclubs with light hearted songs and her perpetual companion, a black cat.

From the 1860s, ukiyo-e, became a source of inspiration for many European impressionist painters. They were affected by the lack of perspective and shadow, the flat areas of strong colors as in Japanese prints. Here, Okuyama returns the genre of impressionism back to its Japanese roots.

MAY BELFORT - TOULOUSE-LAUTREC by Gihachiro Okuyama (1907-1981)

MAY BELFORT - TOULOUSE-LAUTREC

By Gihachiro Okuyama (1907-1981)

Born in 1907, OKUYAMA GIHACHIRO studied art under Kasaka Gajin and during the very tough economic times of the 1920s, primarily making a living designing posters and advertising labels eventually for commercial companies. In 1931, he had built up a sufficient reputation and enough money to establish his own advertising company; yet all the while,  very active in both Japan's Sosaka and Shin Hanga art print moments, creating woodblocks which were exhibited in within these organizations. Following WW II, in 1946 he established the Japan Print Institute or Nihon Hanga Kenkyusho, and continued to work as a woodblock artist for most of his life. His prints display a fine and creative style and they are among the rarest of Shin Hanga woodblocks to be found today.

In this print, dated 1956, Okuyama pays tribute to Toulouse-Lautrec in an interpretive reproduction of a famous print of May Belfort, an English singer who became famous on the stages of Parisian nightclubs with light hearted songs and her perpetual companion, a black cat.

From the 1860s, ukiyo-e, became a source of inspiration for many European impressionist painters. They were affected by the lack of perspective and shadow, the flat areas of strong colors as in Japanese prints. Here, Okuyama returns the genre of impressionism back to its Japanese roots.

MY FAVORITE FOX

MY FAVORITE FOX

“Remnant of a Dream” by Takeuchi Seihō

Issued September 20, 1940

Takeuchi Seihō (竹内 栖鳳, December 20, 1864 - August 23, 1942), whose real name was Takeuchi Tunekichi,was a Japanese painter of the nihongo genre, active from the Meiji through the early Shōwa period. One of the founders of nihongo, his works spanned half a century and he was regarded as master of the prewar Kyoto circle of painters.

Seihō was born in Kyōto, where as a child, he loved to draw and expressed his desire to become an artist, eventually becoming a disciple of Kono Bairei of the Maruyam-Shijo school of traditional painting. In 1882, two of his works received awards at the Naikoku Kaiga Kyoshinkai (Domestic Painting Competition), one of the first modern painting competitions in Japan, which launched him on his career.

He toured Europe while attending the Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1900 which gave him the opportunity to study Western art trends. When he returned to Japan, greatly influenced by what he had seen, he established a unique style which combined the realist techniques of Maruyama-Shijo style with Western forms of realism, which in turn became one of the principal styles of modern nihongo. While noted for his landscapes, he was most noted for his favorite subjects — animals — which were often painted in amusing poses.

In 1909 he became a professor at the Kyoto Municipal College of Painting and established his own private school, the Chikujokai. In 1913, Seihō was appointed a court painter to the Imperial Household Agency and in 1919 he was nominated to the Fine Arts Academy (Teikoku Bijutsuin). He was also one of the first persons to be awarded the Order of Culture when it was created in 1937.

For myself, his whimsical fox was the inspiration for my own fox characters in the cartoon series "My Neighbors the Nekojins" and "The Adventures of Tajimi Jones."

(Nihonga (日本画) or literally “Japanese-style paintings” are paintings that have been made in accordance with traditional Japanese artistic conventions, techniques and materials. While based on traditions over a thousand years old, the term was coined in the Meiji to distinguish such works from Western-style paintings.)

SHIN YOSHIWARA — OIRAN DOCHU

SHIN YOSHIWARA — OIRAN DOCHU

FROM THE SERIES TOKYO MEISHO

(FAMOUS PLACES OF TOKYO)

The name of the artist of this print is unknown; however we know that it was done in 1925 as a lithograph rather than printed by the more common means of printing a typical ukiyo-e. In the print, one sees courtesans of the pleasure quarter, Shin Yoshiwara, parading with their assistants on Nakamachi Street. Typically in earlier times, such a procession was the main event of the day in Shin Yoshiwara and was referred to as “Oiran Dochu.” The custom had in fact been discontinued with the advent of Meiji but was revived on the occasion of the Taisho Expo in 1915. Here the women had the opportunity to show off their beauty and gorgeous clothes.