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ANDO HIROSHIGE (1797-1858)

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Ando Hiroshige
(1797-1858)

Hiroshige was born and died in Edo, old Tokyo, a city founded in 1590 by Tokugawa Ieyasu. After his victory at Seki Ga Hara, Ando became the de facto capital of Japan.

Ando Hiroshige was a samurai, his family were legendary retainers to the Tokugawa. In time of peace, they became firefighters and Hiroshige continued in this role twenty years after he had become a successful Ukiyo-e artist. Within two years of his father's death the young Ando Tokutaro began to study under the Ukiyo-e master Utagawa Toyohiro, who gave him his artist's name. Like firefighters everywhere, Hiroshige presumably had plenty of spare time to develop his natural love for drawing. He remained in the Utagawa studio studying for seventeen years.

Although Hiroshige came finally to share the values of an artisan, he never lost his samurai sense of refinement and correctness. This is displayed throughout in his work. After the death of Toyohiro in 1828, Hiroshige went out on his own, turning to landscape prints, eventually publishing a ten print series, "Views of Edo." At that time landscape prints satisfied the Japanese public's desire to see things they had never seen and probably would never see.

There was no photography. Society was not mobile and there was a great hunger for the unknown. Hiroshige's work soon created a sensation. The demand was great and could successfully be fulfilled only by him.

Perhaps stimulated by the success of Hokusai's "Thirty-six views of Mount Fuji" in 1834, (Hokusai's print from this series, "The Great Wave" is considered the most famous graphic image in the world), Hiroshige began what would become his best known work, "Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido. "Essential to it's success was a journey Hiroshige took along the Tokaido road between Kyoto and Edo, observing and sketching as he went.

This experience led Hiroshige to depict the Tokaido many times later in his career.

Twenty years later Hiroshige undertook the series "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo". By this time he was immensely popular and his artistic output was large and diverse. Coincident with this series Hiroshige shaved his head, renouncing the world to become a Buddhist priest. Perhaps this explains the aloof and lonely spirit that runs through the series.

This series is considered Hiroshige's grand farewell performance. He died not long after it's completion. The Edo he loved and illustrated, too is gone, swallowed by modern Tokyo.

UKYIO-E COLLECTION
UTAGAWA KUNIYOSHI (1798-1861)

Utagawa Kuniyoshi
(1798-1861)

Kuniyoshi was one of the most prolific of Ukiyo-e artists. His working life was 45 years. The descriptive catalog of his warrior prints alone, lists over 350 "triptychs" (large three sheet compositions, each sheet "oban" in size) and over 1,500 single sheets arranged in series.

Life is never easy for a visionary and so it was for Kuniyoshi. The son of a silk dyer, he entered the studio of Toyokuni (Kunisada) about 1810 and was trained in the Utagawa school of theatrical portraiture. His first heroic tryptic appeared in 1818 and exciting as these works are to us now, at that time it made little favorable impression.

Lord Kohayakawa Saemonenosuke Takakage

When Kuniyoshi made a series of "oban" prints of famous Chinese heroes called the "Suikoden," public acclaim grew.

His traditional theatrical and landscape work continued throughout his career, but once his reputation was attained he was able to convert the public to his own tastes for legendary and historical subjects.

Apart from Kuniyoshi's tryptic's obvious dramatic qualities, they show a masterly appreciation of the possibility of a completely integrated composition rarely found. In Kuniyoshi's best work the three sheets are inseparable. We can almost feel the impudence of the Witch in summoning up the skeleton-spectre, the despair of the defeated General, her father and the powerful heroism on Mitsukuni's face as he fearlessly defies the apparition.

From the 1830's on, Kuniyoshi continued to contribute to every branch of art. He worked closely with Kunisada and Hiroshige, both of whom he collaborated with on numerous occasions. This placed him in the highest position amongst his contemporaries.

After the 1850's his health declined, as did the quality of his work. This was partially due to overwork and semi-poverty. He died from the effects of a stroke at only sixty three years old.

In 1961 an exhibit of Kuniyoshi's work at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, for the first time, brought a fully representational range before the public.

This demonstrated his obsession with Japan's heroic past. Indeed it has been the warrior prints which have continued to impress collectors and the public alike.

Major exhibits in 1978 and 1979 at the Rikkar Art Museum in Tokyo established for all time Kuniyoshi's immortal reputation.

In his lifetime and until recently, Kuniyoshi has been under appreciated. Perhaps because he was an overt virtuoso in a society where covert virtuosity - restrained, if not invisible - was the norm. We know he chafed at his poverty and was annoyed that some of his less talented, but conservative, contemporaries were wealthy, while he wore rags.

Lord Hashibachiku Zun Nokami Hideyoshi

Kuniyoshi seems to have taken pleasure in portraying opulent fabrics, suits of armor, weapons, saddles, ships and houses - inserting them into action scenes where they were subjected to the destructive forces whose ultimate source was his vehemently fertile imagination.