The name of Suzuki Harunobu is familiar to every admirer of Japanese prints. It is in large measure to his genius that the development of full-colour printing is due. He was not only the first artist to make use of the new process, but he took advantage of it to bring out prints of a novel type. Very dainty and graceful these were, and in the poetic allusions or quiet humour with which they were charged, and in the quality of the brush-strokes with which the drawings were executed, they made a direct appeal to men of taste. Success was instantaneous. By the year 1765 Harunobu had come to the front and distanced all competitors for popular favour. The serenity and compelling charm of his compositions brought him wide fame. Realizing the possibilities that now lay before him, he proudly exclaimed, “Why should I degrade [pg 15] myself by the delineation of actors?” His ambition, he said, was to become “the true successor of the painters in the department of printing”; that is to say, to design prints that should be worthy substitutes for paintings. Instead of restricting himself to a few primary or secondary hues and the variations resulting from their superposition, he mixed his colours to get the precise tint desired, and he used as many colour-blocks as were needed for the effects at which he aimed. The Yedo-yé, or Yedo pictures, as the prints had been called from the fact that they were produced only at the eastern capital, were now denominated nishiki-yé, or brocade pictures, from the number of colours woven together in them. To the printing itself, the charging of the blocks with colour, the character and quality of the pigments and of the paper used, Harunobu gave careful attention, and these things were greatly improved as a result of his experiments.

Under his leadership the art now entered upon the period of its greatest triumphs. In the eager search for novel subjects scarcely anything was left untouched. History, mythology, and romance, the numberless fêtes and merrymakings of the people and the daily routine of their lives, representations of celebrated poets and heroes, scenes from the drama, portraits of popular actors and courtesans, the revels of the Yoshiwara, animals and plants, familiar scenes and famous landscapes, furnished motives for almost endless broadsheets and book illustrations. No other art was ever more crowded with human interest.

The forward movement in print-designing at this epoch was helped on by a number of highly gifted artists who seem to have worked together to some extent. Katsukawa Shunsho̅, who took up the theatrical branch of print-designing that Harunobu scorned, is one of the most distinguished masters of the Ukiyoé school. He was a designer of marked power, a colourist of the first rank. His works are not yet appreciated as they should be, but the finest of them yield pure aesthetic delight of most exalted quality. Kitao Shigemasa, Ippitsusai Buncho̅, and Isoda Koryusai also rank among the first-rate men of this period. In the contest for popular favour during the ten years following the death of Harunobu, which took place in the summer of 1770, it has been said that the guerdon rested upon Koryusai, but that is a mistake, [pg 16] for both Shunsho̅ and Shigemasa stood higher in the estimation of qualified judges. All, however, were surpassed a few years later by Kiyonaga, the last great artist of the Torii line and the culminating figure in the history of the Popular School. He conquered by the rugged strength and marvellous quality of his brush-strokes, by the richness of his colouring and the ripe mastery he displayed over all the resources of his craft. But also he created a new type of design—that which found expression in the great diptychs and triptychs that stand as the triumphs of colour-printing. At the height of his power his influence over his contemporaries was so great that, without exception, the younger men among them copied his style as closely as they could.

When Kiyonaga, about 1793, stopped designing prints, the decadence had already set in. The decade that followed was a period of rapid deterioration, with Utamaro as its particular evil genius. Yet many of the most splendid of the prints were produced in that decade. Where shall we look for anything finer than Eishi's wonderful series with the chocolate background, or his triptychs of the Prince Genji series? Where shall we find anything to equal the brilliant characterization of Sharaku's actor portraits? Where else shall we turn for such marvellously facile rhythmic line, such swift, vital handling as that which made Utamaro's masterpieces the despair of his many imitators? Toyokuni also designed many fine prints; but as he was a man of less force than the others I have named, he fell faster and farther than they did, and fewer of his works command our admiration.

HARUNOBU. The Sleeping Elder Sister.

I have left myself little time to speak of two eminent artists, both of them world-renowned, who by their genius made the latter years of the Ukiyoé school as notable in their way as any in its entire history. Either Hokusai or Hiroshige might well engage our attention for an entire evening. Both were extraordinarily prolific; Hokusai was the more versatile and has the wider reputation. Both are among the greatest landscape artists the world has ever known. Their numerous prints of landscapes are a revelation of the possibilities of originality in composition and variety of interest in this field. Unless one has studied these prints in fine examples, it is impossible to realize how great is their [pg 17] merit. This is true of all the prints, but particularly true of Hiroshige's. Between the best impressions and the very good ones the difference is really astonishing. But the best are so extremely rare as to make it probable that because of the difficulty and the cost of printing, very few of them were issued—the publishers finding cheaper editions more profitable.

Though classed as Ukiyoé artists, Hokusai and Hiroshige really represent a separate movement which undoubtedly would have crystallized into a distinct school had worthy followers arisen to carry it forward, had the times been different, and, last but not least, had the genius of the two masters been less transcendent.

In this sketch of the history of the art of Ukiyoé colour-printing only the more salient features have been touched upon. Of the prints themselves it is not too much to say that the finest of them are the most beautiful specimens of printing that have been done in any land at any time.

Yet none but the most primitive methods—or what from our point of view may seem such—were employed. The most wonderful among all the prints is but a “rubbing” or impression taken by hand from wood blocks. The artist having drawn the design with the point of a brush in outline upon thin paper, it was handed over to the engraver, who began his part of the work by pasting the design face downward upon a flat block of wood, usually cherry, sawn plankwise as in the case of the blocks used by European wood-engravers in the time of Dürer. The paper was then scraped at the back until the design showed through distinctly in every part. Next, the wood was carefully cut away, leaving the lines in relief, care being taken to preserve faithfully every feature of the brush-strokes with which the drawing was executed. A number of impressions were then taken in Chinese ink from this “key block” and handed to the artist to fill in with colour. This ingenious plan, which is manifestly an outgrowth of the early custom of colouring the ink prints (sumi-yé) by hand, and which perhaps would never have been thought of had not the colour itself been an afterthought, enabled the artist to try many experiments in colour arrangement with a minimum amount of labour. The colour scheme and ornamentation of the surfaces having been determined, the [pg 18] engraver made as many subsidiary blocks[5] as were required, the parts meant to take the colour being left raised and the rest cut away. Accurate register was secured by the simplest of devices. A right-angled mark engraved at the lower right-hand corner of the original block, and a straight mark in exact line with its lower arm at the left, were repeated upon each subsequent block, and, in printing, the sheets were laid down so that their lower and right-hand edges corresponded with the marks so made. The defective register which may be observed in many prints was sometimes caused by unequal shrinking or swelling of the blocks. In consequence of this, late impressions are often inferior to the early ones, even though printed with the same care, and from blocks that had worn very little. The alignment will usually be found to be exact upon one side of the print, but to get further out of register as the other side is approached.