Yoshitoshi, Spirit and Spectacle
Philadelphia Museum of Art
April 16 - August 18, 2019
Reviewed by Ed Voves
Yoshitoshi's woodblock prints are the subject of a fascinating exhibition, Yoshitoshi, Spirit and Spectacle, now in its final week, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Nearly the entire exhibit comes from the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which has one of the richest holdings of Japanese art outside of Japan.
In a year marked by spectacular exhibitions of Japanese art in the U.S., it is difficult to keep up with this "embarrassment" of riches. It is vital, all the same, to view the Philadelphia Museum of Art exhibit. This splendid assessment of Yoshitoshi 's life and career also brilliantly surveys the craft techniques which went into carving and printing the memorable images of Japan, past and present, which Yoshitoshi created.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019)
Picture of Kanagi Toshikage's Memorial Portrait of Taiso (Tsukioka) Yoshitoshi, 1892
Born in 1839, Yoshitoshi was just on the brink of manhood when Commodore Matthew Perry, U.S. Navy, sailed into Tokyo Bay on July 8, 1853. Perry's orders were to force the Japanese to open their ports to American ships and trade. Combining diplomatic bluff and target practice with the modern naval artillery mounted on his ships, Perry succeeded in his "open door" mission. With the coming of Perry's squadron, life in Japan, the Japan of Yoshitoshi's childhood, changed forever.
The second "red-letter" date in Yoshitoshi's life was the year 1868, by which time he was already highly regarded as an artist. In 1868, the dynamic, young Emperor Meiji succeeded in curtailing the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate. For several centuries, the Emperor of Japan had been little more than a figurehead, while Japanese society languished in a state of feudalism where everyone knew their place - and was expected to keep it.
The most famous form of Japanese woodblock prints was popularly known as Ukiyo-e, the "floating world." Nothing seemed to change in the colorful, magical realm of Ukiyo-e. Then, between 1853 and 1868, Japan ceased to float. It was full-steam ahead and artists like Yoshitoshi had to adapt.
Yoshitoshi learned the art of Ukiyo-e from one of the great practitioners of the genre, Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861). Kuniyoshi was renowned for his skill at depicting Samurai warriors and military regalia. He was also a master of the macabre side of Japanese folklore and mythology. His scene of a monstrous skeleton specter, summoned by the sorceress, Takiyasha, to haunt an enemy during the ancient Heian era, is one of the most famous illustrations of ghost stories in Japanese art.
Yoshitoshi was very much an artist in the Kuniyoshi mode early in his career – and not always for the better. Yet, despite the derivative and uneven quality of many of Yoshitoshi’s early works, he demonstrated his skill with a number of masterpieces. One of these is a combined three-sheet image, General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle during the Invasion of Korea in 1590. The date of this work is particularly significant:1863.
In August of that year, a British naval squadron bombarded the port of Kagoshima in reprisal for the attack on a party of British travelers by armed members of the Satsuma-clan. The resulting battle demonstrated the superiority of Britain’s modern naval firepower over the bravery of the Japanese defenders.
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi,
General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle during the Invasion of Korea in 1590
Yoshitoshi’s print hearkens back to an earlier war against foreigners, in this case the invasion of Korea by a large army of Samurai warriors in 1590. It is a deliberately traditional battle piece, almost anachronistic in style and technique. Yoshitoshi emphasizes the ancient warrior code of the Samurai amid the ferocity of combat.
There is also a remarkable twist to the scene, revealing the tension between the intrusive forces of the modern, Western world and the time-honored conventions of Japanese society in 1863.
In the right hand corner of General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle, Yoshitoshi places the image of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, partly shrouded by the smoke from the battlefield.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Detail of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's
General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle during the Invasion of Korea in 1590
If this had been intended as an historical work only, then Yoshitoshi would have depicted a fortress in the style of the late 1500’s rather than St. Paul's. Instead, he conflates past and present, reminding his audience that Japan had often to struggle against foreign military forces in battles where courage alone was not enough to guarantee victory.
However much a Western art lover may appreciate General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle, another 1863 work lingers in the memory of those fortune to see it. This sensational print also illustrates a story from Japan's past. The effect is very modern, given the simplicity and clarity of the design. The brilliant cropping which we see in The Twelfth‑Century Shogun Minamoto Yoritomo Releasing a Thousand Cranes at the Beach at Yuigahama points to the effect that Japanese woodblock prints were shortly to have on the Impressionist artists in the West.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019)
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's The Twelfth‑Century Shogun Minamoto Yoritomo Releasing a Thousand Cranes at the Beach at Yuigahama,1863
Yoshitoshi's skill was thus evident from early-on. However, his emphasis on sensational episodes and plenty of blood and gore in many of his other early works backfired.
Anne Lloyd, Photos (2019)
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's Aizu Kōmon Kagekatsu, Examining a Head, 1868
Initially popular, Yoshitoshi’s violent and disturbing prints were increasingly rejected by the public and then by publishers. In 1871, he had an emotional breakdown and was living in poverty, supported by his mistress, Okoto, who sold her jewels and rich clothes to support him.
Why did such a talented artist come to this impasse so early in his career? Yoshitoshi’s art reflected the violence, verging on anarchy, into which Japan had descended following Commodore Perry’s arrival in 1853. Various factions vied for control of the country, some in favor of a strong Western-oriented government controlled by the Emperor, others supporting the feudal Shogunate and traditional society.
Yoshitoshi was caught in the cross-fire of Japan's "time of troubles" and his art suffered. Eventually, Yoshitoshi pulled himself out of his despair and started creating prints which helped regain some of his lost prominence. Ironically, it was the popularity of the newspaper industry and the need for illustrations which revived his career. The modernity encouraged by the victorious Emperor Meiji rescued Yoshitoshi from a downward spiral into oblivion.
Yoshitoshi changed his name to Taiso which means “great resurrection. He began to create scenes of Japan and of the Japanese people adapting to Western ways. Yoshitoshi's depictions of his countrymen in Western garb have a curious quality, charming in some respects, faintly absurd in others, as in his group portrait of the Emperor Meiji's generals in French-style uniforms.
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, I Want to Cancel My Subscription; Woman Reading Newspaper
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Detail of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's
Famous Soldiers of Japan (Heroes of the Satsuma Rebellion),1878
Yoshitoshi, despite pandering to the Meiji-era obsession to appear up-to-date with Western ways, remained devoted to the exacting standards of Ukiyo-e. His mature style preserved much of the authentic culture of Japan.
When we study the color woodcut on three panels (triptych) selected as the signature image for the exhibition by the Philadelphia Museum curators, we are looking at a work of art of the highest caliber. Created in 1883, Yoshitoshi's The Heian Poet Yasumasa Playing the Flute by Moonlight, Subduing the Bandit Yasusuke with His Music is worthy of comparison with any major artist of the West during the same period.
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, The Heian Poet Yasumasa Playing the Flute by Moonlight, Subduing the Bandit Yasusuke with His Music, 1883
Learning about the laborious step-by-step process by which a Yoshitoshi's masterpiece was created is a revelation. An outstanding short film and a complete sequence of printed sheets is on view in Yoshitoshi: Spirit and Spectacle. The astonishing regimen of artistic vision and the patient, almost unnerving, skill used in carving the sequence of printing blocks is presented in a readily comprehensible survey.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Photo of the short film at the Yoshitoshi, Spirit & Spectacle exhibition, showing the techniques used in Japanese woodblock printing
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Gallery view of the Yoshitoshi exhibition, showing a display of the stages of making woodblock prints with the technique used by Yoshitoshi.
According to the excellent exhibit commentary, the woodblock printing process involved the commissioning of an image by a patron (increasingly newspaper or book publishers). When the artist finished the drawing, it was given to a woodcarver who created a block for each color in the picture and one for the black outline. Used in sequence, the color-saturated blocks produced the finished print.
The standard size sheet of paper used for woodblock prints, called an oban, was 15 by 11 inches. Large compositions were made by positioning two, three or more prints, side-by-side, just as artists in Medieval and Renaissance Europe had painted diptychs or triptychs. This means of course that the labor of carving blocks would have doubled or tripled (or more!) for these large multi-sheet prints!
To create a color woodcut triptych like The Heian Poet Yasumasa Playing the Flute by Moonlight is collaborative effort of the highest order. Yet not even Yoshitoshi in his prime could always achieve such a near state of perfection. In the same year, he and the master wood carver, Horikō Yamamoto tō, boldly tried a winter-themed triptych of three beautiful women in traditional garb, set against a snowy landscape. Dealing with much more subtle shades of misty grays and light blues, it was not possible to achieve the seamless effect of the Yasumasa triptych. But Yoshitoshi and his colleague came astonishingly close to complete success!
Anne Lloyd, Photos (2019),
Yoshitoshi's Winter: Maboroshidayū with Snow Rabbit at Daishorō, 1883
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Gallery view of the Yoshitoshi exhibition,
showing the display of the One Hundred Aspects of the Moon print series.
Twenty-four of the One Hundred Aspects of the Moon prints are on view in the final gallery of the exhibition. To quote the exhibit curators:
Images of the moon in its many phases provide a common backdrop for the characters in this series. Stoic warriors, samurai, everyday townspeople, demons, poets, and courtesans—drawn from Japanese and Chinese history and folklore, literature, and theater—reference stories relating to the moon... In these mature works, Yoshitoshi achieved his distinctive aesthetic by combining flat design with a strategic approach to realistic perspective that conveys suspended moments of action.
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, Ariko no Naishi Weeping,
from the series One Hundred Aspects of the Moon, 1886
Yoshitoshi died shortly after completing the One Hundred Aspects of the Moon series. Although he did have student workers in his studio at the end of his career, no artist in Japan could match his vision or expertise. The great age of Japan's woodblock prints was over.
Yoshitoshi may not have been able to pass on the torch of this amazing Japanese art form but he did succeed in a much more important respect: contributing to the preservation of the living spirit of Japan!
The British Museum is currently presenting an exhibition on Manga, which traces its roots to the woodblock printing of Japan's past, to Yoshitoshi in particular. I plan to do a review of the Manga exhibit catalog, published by Thames and Hudson, in which I will further comment on the achievements and influence of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi.
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Text: Copyright of Ed Voves, all rights reserved
Images courtesy of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Original photos © Anne Lloyd
Introductory Image:
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Detail of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's The Heian Poet Yasumasa Playing the Flute by Moonlight, Subduing the Bandit Yasusuke with His Music,1883. Full record below.
Anne Lloyd, Photos (2019) Picture of Kanagi Toshikage's Memorial Portrait of Taiso (Tsukioka) Yoshitoshi, 1892. Color woodcut. Blocks carved by Horikō Enkatsu. Published by Akiyama Buemon, 9 banchi 3 chōme Muromachi Nihonbashi‑ku,Tokyo. Sheet (ōban tate‑e): approximately 15 1/2 × 10 1/2 inches (39.4 × 26.7 cm) Purchased with funds contributed by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, 1989 1989‑47‑641
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Japanese,1839-1892) General Masakiyo at Shinshū Castle during the Invasion of Korea in 1590. Color woodcut on three panels (triptych). Overall:15 1/2 × 31 1/2 inches. Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gift of Sidney A. Tannenbaum, 1978. #1978-129-16 a-c.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's The Twelfth‑Century Shogun Minamoto Yoritomo Releasing a Thousand Cranes at the Beach at Yuigahama. From the series Famous Sights along the Tōkaidō ,1863. Color woodcut. Blocks carved by Katata Hori Chō. Published by Shōbundō. Sheet (ōban tate‑e): approximately 15 1/2 × 10 1/2 inches (39.4 × 26.7 cm). Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gift of Sidney A. Tannenbaum, 1978.
Anne Lloyd, Photos (2019) Picture of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi's Aizu Kōmon Kagekatsu, Examining a Head (From the series, Selection of One Hundred Warriors), 1868.
Color woodcut. Published by Ohashi. Sheet (ōban tate‑e): approximately 15 1/2 × 10 1/2 inches (39.4 × 26.7 cm). Philadelphia Museum of Art. Gift of Sidney A. Tannenbaum, 1978.Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Japanese,1839-1892) I Want to Cancel My Subscription; Woman Reading Newspaper, from the series A Collection of Desires, 1878. Color woodcut. Published by Inoue Mohei Sheet (ōban tate‑e): approximately 15 1/2 × 10 1/2 inches (39.4 × 26.7 cm). Purchased with funds contributed by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, 1989. Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1989‑47‑42
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Japanese,1839-1892) The Heian Poet Yasumasa Playing the Flute by Moonlight, Subduing the Bandit Yasusuke with His Music, 1883. Color woodcut on three panels (triptych). Ōban triptych: 14 1/16 x 28 7/8 inches. Purchased with funds contributed by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, 1989. Image courtesy of Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2019.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Photo of the short film on view at the Yoshitoshi, Spirit and Spectacle exhibition, showing the techniques used in Japanese woodblock printing.
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Gallery view of the Yoshitoshi, Spirit and Spectacle exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Photo shows a display of the stages of printing a woodblock print according to the technique used by Yoshitoshi.
Anne Lloyd, Photos (2019) Picture and detail of Yoshitoshi's Winter: Maboroshidayū with Snow Rabbit at Daishorō, the Flower Mansion in Nezu. From the series The Four Seasons at their Height (Zensei shiki), 1883. Color woodcut on three panels (triptych). Blocks carved by Horikō Yamamoto tō and published by Akiyama Buemon, 9 banchi 3 chōme Muromachi Nihonbashi‑ku, Tokyo. Sheet (ōban tate‑e triptych): approximately 15 1/2 × 31 1/2 inches (39.4 × 80 cm). Philadelphia Museum of Art. Purchased with funds contributed by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, 1989. # 1989‑47‑338a—c
Anne Lloyd, Photo (2019) Gallery view of the Yoshitoshi, Spirit and Spectacle exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Photo shows the display of the One Hundred Aspects of the Moon woodblock print series.
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Japanese,1839-1892) Ariko no Naishi Weeping, from the series One Hundred Aspects of the Moon, 1886. Color woodcut. Sheet (ōban tate-e): approximately 15 1/2 × 10 1/2 inches. Purchased with funds contributed by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, 1989. Image courtesy of Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2019
