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ARTISTIC JAPAN

Illustrations and Essays,

COLLECTED BY

S. BING.

VOLUME II

SAMPSON

LONDON :

LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE & RIVINGTON,

LIMITED,

J^t. Qunëtan’ë ?Öouöc,

FETTER LANE, FLEET STREET, E.C.

1889.

The

W

'll try of Art,

1, a. a.

LONDON :

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.

• I^L 0 \

THE GETTY CENTER

1 I nr? a r?v

ARTISTIC JAPAN:

A Monthly Illustrated Journal

OF

ARTS AND INDUSTRIES

COMPILED BY

S. BING

WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF

Mr. WM. ANDERSON, MM. PH. BURTY, VICTOR CHAMPIER, TH. DURET, L. FALIZE, Mr. ERNEST HART, MM. EDMOND DE GONCOURT, LOUIS GONSE, EUGÈNE GUILLAUME, T. HAYASHI, PAUL MANTZ, Professor ROBERTS-AUSTEN,

Mr. C. H. READ, MM. ROGER MARX, ANTONIN PROUST,

ARY RENAN, Mr. STUART SAMUELS, M. EDM. TAIGNY,

ETC., ETC.

The English Edition is under the Editorship of

MR. MARCUS B. HUISH

LONDON :

SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE & RI VINGT ON,

LIMITED ,

â>t. Sunätan’ä ??ouâf,

FETTER LANE, FLEET STREET, E.C.

Contents of Number 7.

ENGRAVING IN JAPAN, by M. Théodore Duret .... 73

DESCRIPTION OF PLATES . 80

SEPARATE PLATES.

Il II.	Ladies Boating. By Kiyonaga.
HF.	Three Bronze Vases. Date, eighteenth century.
AJA.	Sparrows on a Branch of Bamboo.	By Nosan.
HB.	Scene of Indoor Life, By Moronobu.
DI.	Industrial Design.
IC.	Mandarin Ducks. By Hokusai.
EA.	Decorative Design. Bamboos.
IE.	On the Banks of the Sumida-gawa.	By Hokusai.
HH.	Industrial Design. Trunks of Trees.
AJB.	Piece of Silk with Pattern of Peacocks, Seventeenth century,
Cover.	Flower-seller. By Kiyonaga.

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

design on to wood or copper ; and the printer, who produces from the wood

or metal the finished print. In Europe the de- signer and the engraver are generally artists, and the printer is a workman who takes from a machine any number of uniform proofs. In Japan the printer, equally with the designer and en- graver, is an artist, working with an artist’s taste and fancy. Having only the most simple means and materials, and no machine, he knows no repetition or stiffness, but in the choice and mixing of the colours on the plate he makes endless variations, and so avoids all monotony or uniformity.

In the selection of Japanese engravings, taking those where the three artists - — de- signer, engraver, and printer — have put their very best work, one finds many specimens perfect in their way, and which are practically unsurpassable. In engraving, the Japanese have always held to certain methods, which give to their productions a certain special originality of their own ; they have confined themselves to the use of wood on which to engrave designs, which have been drawn

ö O 7

by the artists themselves by means of the

brush.

When a European writes he employs a pen, and occasionally he may

use one for drawing ; but more often he uses a pencil ; but when he paints, he invariably takes a brush. In Japan and China it is not at all the same ; there, when one writes, draws, or paints, the implement is the same — the brush, held in the hand, raised up over the paper.

The result of the constant use of the same instru- ment is great dexterity in the handling of it ; and as the strokes of a brush filled with ink or colour make lines and strokes that one cannot alter, certainty of

74

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

touch and boldness of hand are the essential points that every artist has been obliged to seek after and obtain.

The paper on which the de- sign has been traced having been glued to the wood on which it is to be cut, the engraver sets to work to reproduce in the wood all the suppleness and fulness which the design on the paper had re- ceived from the use of the brush as an implement.

Japanese engravers have arrived at such clever- m« on a Balcony, by Kunisad«. ness in this respect that even an experienced eye can hardly detect designs direct from the brush. When one adds that Japanese engravings are as a rule taken on the very finest paper, and that in the first state they are of great rarity, one can understand that they combine all the necessary conditions to charm the eye of an artist, and to excite the covetousness of collectors.

The art of engraving on wood came to Japan from China. As a means of illustrating books it is comparatively modern ; the Isé monogatari of 1604 is the first remarkable specimen of it. It is an illustrated romance. The engravings in it are in an archaic and rather clumsy style, but already show

in conception and execution the characteristics of the art as it is in its present development.

During the seventeenth century books with engravings were rare, until the time of Ishigawa Moronobu, who flourished from 1680 to about 1700. Moronobu has treated very nearly all the styles to which the art at that time could be applied; he illustrated romances — “ meishos ” — or descriptions of countries, a series of books with plates, some of types of the

75

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

By Issai.

Japanese people, others of beasts and plants, very realistically given or employed as decorative mo- tives. His style, although archaic, is full of force and movement. It is, as it were, the entrance to the study of engraving in Japan.

The impulse given by Moronobu was never to die away. During the seventeenth century artists who illus- trated books followed each other without interruption, becoming more and more numerous. We must in the first rank place Sukénobu, who produced his best works in 1730. He applied himself to the representation of Japanese women under all aspects, and occupying themselves in every way ; and as stuffs were at that date highly decorated, so the women he has drawn are enveloped in robes showing a wondrous diversity of motives and colours.

Sukénobu had pupils and successors who bring us down to the close of the eighteenth century. The art of printing in colours, already for some time originated and perfected, was now adapted for book illustration. From Moronobu, by a series of intermediates down to Hokusai, one can connect chronologically a library of books or albums of engravings of every kind of shape, style, or impression, representing a world very original and lively.

Engraving, properly speaking— the printed image on a loose sheet — developed itself side by side with the book or album. So the most ancient specimens of the art of printing in Japan are engravings. These were religious images of the roughest description that were sold in the temples of Buddha, and which repre- sented that god or some local saint. Quite at the end of the seventeenth century, under the impulse given by Moronobu, Japanese engrav- ing entered upon a phase which was shortly to be greatly enlarged — the repro- duction of the faces of actors

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

and scenes in the theatre. The first specimens of these were printed in black, like all the engravings of the seventeenth cen- tury ; but shortly after they were touched with a brush, and then, between 1710 and 1720, they commenced to be printed in one or two tones of colour.

Coloured engravings now made rapid progress, and in the course of the eighteenth century arrived at great finish.

First of all there are the Torii, who succeeded each other and form a complete school. They produced figures of actors printed in a sombre tone, but very vigorous, and which must form the foundation of every collection of coloured prints.

After them Katsugawa Shunshô, the master of Hokusai, with his two pupils, Shunyei and Shunko, have cleverly depicted actors and their contemporaries.

Extending coloured engraving beyond the theatrical world, powerful artists adapted it to the portrayal of feminine figures, popular scenes, social gatherings, scenes from romances, history, battles, and lastly to landscape.

It is thus that at the end of the eighteenth century, from 1770 to 1800, Japanese coloured prints arrive at such perfection with a series of great designers, who by the fulness and purity of their outlines, and the harmony of their composition, have left many admirable works ; notably such men as Harunobu, Kionaga, Yeishi, Toyokuni, the elder, and lastly

U tamaro.

Every one of these ar- tists has his peculiarity and possesses certain qualities ; but if it were necessary to choose one from the others for the first place, I should select Kionaga. His strong style, free from all manner- isms, grasps life in a search- ing manner. The variety of attitude, the ease of pose, the facial expression, and

Vignette, taken from an envelope for a letter.

f Fugiyama, by Hoku?ai.

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

the broad treatment of the landscape serving for background, make his work very important.

The larger coloured engravings of the present century lose the great elegance which characterised those of the last century. They have not the same harmony of lines and soberness of colouring ; but in spite of having become entirely popular art, they still maintain great power and vitality, when treated by Toyokuni, the younger, Kunisada, Kuniyoshi, and beyond all Hiroshige, the artist of landscape. . Whilst larger coloured prints were losing some of their refinement, another species full of delicacy arose and developed itself. I allude to those refined compositions called Surimonos , of which artists, in the earlier half of this century,

produced a very small number of proofs, and which they gave to their friends or distributed among the members of the little tea-drinking societies on the occasion of certain fêtes and anniversaries. Printed in the most careful way, first in quiet and subdued tones, and later with metallic lustre added, these surimonos were unequalled and unique in the annals of the printer’s art.

Hokusai — born 1760, died 1849 — arrived as a sort of giant to crown the art of printing in Japan. He appeared at an early age under the name of Shunrô, and as he laboured without ceas- ing until his death, his works extend to a period of over fifty years. He found it possible also to take up every style of Japanese engraving, so his

78

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

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productions are of an unlimited and sur- prising extent. Illustrations for romances, history, poetry,

from the

tiny popu- lar books to the edi- tions of forty, fifty, and eighty volumes ; endless books and albums, showing in every phase life in J apan ; men, beasts, and landscape, and

selections of ornament intended for trade purposes ; instruction by example in the art of drawing, large coloured plates in every style, endless suri- monos , notices, maps, and industrial engravings ; — Hokusai has treated every form with equal success. His work, overflowing with life and movement, is full of truth ; it includes popular comicalities and pathetic scenes — the grotesque and the terrible. His work constitutes a monument complete in itself, which embraces everything to be seen by the eye or invented in the brain of a Japanese.

A Village in the Province of Shinano, by Hokusai.

THEODORE DURET.

Taken from the Gakas-ii/ciy by Hokusai.

DESCRIPTION OF PLATES.

In the article on engraving which forms the chief matter of this number, Mr. T. Duret has drawn attention to three names — viz., Moronobu, Kiyonaga, and Hokusai — rand these therefore have the first place among our series of illustrations.

Plate HB is after an engraving by Hishigawa Moronobu, one of the earlier masters, who at the close of the seventeenth century laid the foundations of an era of great notability in the annals of book illustration in Japan, having given the best efforts of his genius to his art.

In his engravings the absence of colours and of every complicated method is noticeable. The manner of working, alone shows the genius, and it does so with great decision, without the help of any elaborate modelling, giving an almost sculptured appearance of relief to the figures represented, enduing them with the appearance of life, and gathering them together in groups full of movement representative of the heroic and popular characters of their era.

The Plate HB is from the Wakoku Hiaku Jo, literally “Japanese Women,” a work in three volumes, which reproduces all sorts and conditions of Japanese women in their every-day employments.

According to a common custom of the time a portion of each page of the book is given up to the text, which offers some explanation for the picture, and is often some original idea, expressed in picturesque language.

Plate IIII, after Kiyonaga, shows us that eighty years of careful technical study certainly add a charm to the severe formula he laid down for himself at the commencement of his artistic career. A collection of charmingly subdued and striking bright colours has been created by his hands, and he adorns his work with lovely combinations of them. His prints show complete mastery over his art.

Torii Kiyonaga (about 1770) played an important part in the development of engraving. He resolutely broke through the archaic style of the other Torii, his predecessors, as shown in the figures of the actors of Kiyomitsu, of which a specimen was given in No. V. ; he reached an advanced stage of art quite modern in style, in which we see landscapes representing great stretches of country full of atmosphere and light, with various distances in perfectly correct perspective, and animated by thoroughly life-like and strong figures. The one before us is a view on the banks of the Sumida gawa (gazva means “river”), with its charming banks on which the town of Yeddo is built, the home of hundreds of artists. This engraving only forms a portion of the whole composition, which spreads over three leaves, of which each is double the size of our reproduction. This plate is not borrowed from any book, but belongs to a kind of engraving that was published separately, called in Japanese, Ichi-mai'-ye (pictures in one piece).

In Plate IE we are still on the luxuriantly planted banks of the Sumida, this time led there by Hokusai. He shows us a small family of people making their way, some autumn evening, by the side of the river. Ehrst of all, there is a young widow — this shown by her girdle being tied in front — and two girls accompanying her ; while they are followed by a little street boy, who has been hired to carry the purchases made, no doubt, by these young ladies, at some fête. On the

80

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

other hand, there is the river, with a curtain of trees beyond it, and behind them there are seen some great white banners. The figures, rather awkward, and of an almost comical appear- ance, seem to be very different from the stately matrons that Kiyonaga has shown us. Hokusai himself will also, shortly, alter the idea he has formed of women ; he will make, in time, heroic figures to people his romances of chivalry ; and when he has undertaken the portrayal of popular life, he will discover models of more solidity. But in his earlier years, when the young artist loves the poetry of refined forms, he cannot produce designs in which heaviness could be seen — and his hand has not yet that astonishing dexterity which will allow him to play wondrous tricks with his brush. But even now his execution is clever, and almost feminine in its refinement, and modest in its pretensions. Do not let us regret this. In this early, rather timid manner, the artist has left us a world of charming beings full of poetic feeling, and which bring to our mind the old nooks which Ghilandajo and Botticelli have drawn. These reminiscences are only appli- cable to the figures themselves, for the landscape in which they move surprises us by its modern character and the method by which it is treated is entirely original. One great principle is adhered to throughout — absolute simplicity. The artist has firmly resolved to eliminate from his sight anything that might have a disturbing effect in proximity to the particular subject he wishes to bring before us — a group of people, standing out clearly in the brightest colours against a vast distance, bounded only by a well-defined horizon. This is the theme proposed for himself in this instance. One can discuss, if one chooses, the object of this principle, but we ought at any rate to do homage to a genius capable of putting a question to us so clearly.

Plate IC. Mandarin Ducks, by Hokusai. It is curious to come straight from the youthful work of this master, to the page of birds which shows us the handiwork of the artist towards the decline of his life. As he has grown older, his ideas have enlarged themselves, and at the same time his brush has acquired freedom, and a strength more and more master-like — and here we see him at his greatest perfection. One point only still remains unchanged with the old man among all those that we have seen altered since his early works ; that is, the empty space round the subject presented, by which means it is shown with the greatest intensity. In the plate before us, a shower of snowflakes fallen on the ground alone break the repose of the surroundings, and in spite of a rather minute representation of them, the impression conveyed by the two birds, taking the whole page, is marvellously striking.

This engraving is taken from a volume containing only fifteen designs, all of this shape. The book is considered the finest specimen of its kind. Its great rarity is to be deplored, but it seems that only a very limited number were printed in the first instance. It is called “ Shashin Gwafu ” — which mean drawings “ from nature ” — and the preface of the book accentuates the meaning of the title. It was written by a friend of the artist’s, called Hirata, and drew great attention to the genius of Hokusai’s work.

The preface bears witness, besides, to the great estimation in which the artist was held, at any rate, among some of his contemporaries, whose opinion of him seems to coincide with ours. “ Hokusai,” the writer says, “ is unlike any one else. While all his predecessors were more or less slaves to classic traditions and hard rules, he alone has allowed his brush to draw according to the feelings of his heart, and he executes what he sees with his eyes, which love nature.” It is certain that this friendly admiration was but little exaggerated.

Plate AJA Sparrows among bamboos, after a Kakemono by Nôsan, school of Shijo.

Sparrows and bamboos in Japan are associated by nature, and every artist has depicted

81

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

them thus, and there is, besides, nothing more tempting to the master of the brush than this plant with its supple and delicate branches bending in graceful curves at every breath ot wind ; and nothing in the world could better complete the picture than its most customary inhabitants, with their lively ways, hopping from branch to branch, in every imaginable attitude, but with various changes which defy the sharpest eye. How wonderfully do the Japanese depict these ever-altering poses ! We hear of set rules, and it may be that the children learn in their earliest youth to draw in various attitudes the body of a bird, just in the way that

they learn to draw the geometrical outline of a house. But it also seems that, in the most

diversified designs, here and there sections of birds are introduced in order to train the eye in their anatomy.

Plate AJB. A piece of satin, date sixteenth century, with a decoration of peacocks. The ground of it is worn and the colours are faded ; but, thanks to the excellence of the manufacture, the design of the decoration still shows in all its original clearness. When one looks at the strength of the outline and the correctness of the drawing, and the noble bearing of the bird standing on the trunk of a tree, one feels as if one was regarding a picture rather than a fragment of clothing, and that it had no other object but to take the place of some water-colour drawing, with its fineness and delicate silky appearance. Such effects are hardly to be recommended as examples for our workmen, except as decorations for our rooms ; but they are appropriate to the grandeur of the dresses of the nobles in Japan, where, contrary to our customs, materials of great width are worn, which lend themselves to the showing off of large and handsome compositions for designs.

The pattern of the robe of which this is a portion represents a design formed of peacocks

on the branches of pine trees. It is made, to a certain extent, in the same way as the finer

European stuffs of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Plates DI, EA and HH show us a series of decorative designs. The first is a ray-like design, consisting of the needles of the pine trees, which are combined with round figures with cut-out edges. A certain brightness is given by the star-shaped ornaments, which, although they are somewhat stiff, remind one of petals of flowers.

The design (EA) of bamboos almost amuses one by the picturesque entanglement of its branches. Seen alone, on a white ground, this design shows imperfections, which, from a decorative point of view, leave the eye unsatisfied, and it is certain that it was intended to be shown on some solid ground which should bring the scattered lines together and display them in their true beauty.

HH is a specimen of a very natural form of decoration. It is formed of trunks of trees, with rough and cracked bark, and their branches cut off — only a few twigs carelessly thrown, as it were, to break the monotony of the ground with their delicate shoots.

Plate HF. Three vases in bronze, date eighteenth century. The centre one, and the one on the right, are reproduced at half their real size, and the conical tube is reduced two-thirds. The last-mentioned specimen loses, by reduction, the fulness of outline which constitutes its particular beauty. The perpendicular ring which is noticed at the level of the handles is for fastening the vase to the wall.

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HOKUSAI’S “MAN-GWA.”

Thou, whom we call “ Hokusai,” venerable artist of this Japan that we would know and love, do thou impart to us some of thy secrets ! Thou art always young, and we grow prematurely old. We hear that thou hadst the weight of fifty-four years upon thee when thou didst commence thy Man-gwa,

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

but we know that thou created it in the spirit of a youth of twenty years. Repeat to us, Genius of the North, that thou hast always loved Nature- — tell us that she is a sweet mistress! One will perhaps look at her with more loving eyes when the age of spectacles is reached. What tender feelings must she have for him who, since his first youth, has given himself up to her worship !

Is it merely a love-affair or a solemn marriage ? It argues, somehow or other, that Nature and the Japanese must be very opposed in sentiment to each other that we should be in error when we state that they had formed a love-match, an indes- tructible and passionate alliance.

Whatever may happen, whatever discovery may be made, whatever the yet unknown, the extreme East, may have in reserve for us, we shall always be sure that the Japanese have been real lovers of nature, and that Hokusai is a charming enter- tainer. One might well have carved on his modest tomb the verses that the scholars of the Renaissance composed for the tomb of Virgil, “ Here rests he whom Nature feared as her rival, and whose funeral seemed, as it were, her own.”

If it is admitted that Hokusai is worthy a place in the first rank of inde- pendent and original artists, one must assign to him immediately a characteristic which he shares with the most highly inspired of the masters of our Western Art, namely, unconsciousness. It is clear that this wonderful man never knew his own value. We know that he lived in poverty, died at an advanced age and full of years — that he worked for trade purposes, did much book-illustra- tion, and changed his residence and his name according to his fancy. From this we gather that he was a philosophical and simple artist, applying himself to all branches of art, identifying himself with no particular one — in fact, an inspired being, a nomad of the great artist-family. If we could have paid him a visit some fifty years ago, perhaps in some little room in Yedo, and if we had told him that what came from his brush would in the hereafter

be an invaluable and world-wide lesson — he would in all probability have laughed at us. And perhaps

Fishers, taken from The Hundred Views of Fujiyama, by Hokusai.

-- - . ± . ...

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

we might have done him harm — we might have altered his simplicity.

Japan was in his time in a healthy state; but there were evidently then, as now, various forms of public opinion. That of the old school attached itself to ancient forms, as a protest against the popular school which also had its public. The genius of Hokusai pleased the humble mind, whose instinctive criticism appreciated the novelty of his manner — an aestheticism more liberal, with stronger lines and greater wealth of fancy combined with a thorough intention of fol- lowing Nature in her most rapid changes, than the schools which preceded it.

Hokusai worked because of his personal desire to do so — because he longed to create — like Rembrandt when he engraved on copper — without thinking of himself. He threw to the winds his lovely works, which disappeared it mattered not where. They now return to us, forming hundreds of volumes which we do not hesitate to add to the library of Art which includes the whole world.

It is not our purpose now to study Hokusai as a painter— he was a great painter — -but as a designer of illustrations ; and as such his Man-gwa is doubtless his greatest work. Man-gwa means literally “rapid sketches,’’ and we have fourteen portfolios of these, containing some thousands of varied subjects, printed in the simplest manner at a minimum of expense. No one can pass over the marvellous effects produced by the Japanese in wood-engraving and coloured printing. In the last number of this magazine we gave a lengthy explanation of their method of work.

It is curious that the Japanese have never taken to engraving on copper. The reason in all probability is because their only instrument for writing is the brush, charged with Indian-ink — at the same time the freest and the broadest of all writing appliances.

Hokusai had the good fortune to have his originals beautifully engraved — as facsimiles of brush-work nothing can equal a good copy of the Man-giva ; it seems as if they were the original drawings from the artist’s hand.

The Man-gwa is, as it were, an encyclopaedia. The Japanese, imitating the Chinese, appear to have always taken pleasure in

»5

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

By Keisai Yeisen.

repetitions, and their methodical minds delighted in classifica- tion and information set out in regular order. Thus it is that they were induced to make a species of index to Nature herself. The Man-gwa is neither the first or the only dictionary of this description.

Beginning in 1745, Morikuni published, in nine

volumes, the Jiki-Shiho , an encyclopaedia of the designer’s art. One finds there examples of the methods of drawing flowers, birds, trees, landscapes, or groups ; and there are other collections which resemble celebrated works by Japanese and Chinese artists of later date. Scenes of popular life and theatrical incidents were collected in the Imbut-su- sogwa (1722), in the Yeihon Yamato-hiji, besides a quantity of other volumes. According to local custom, collections such as these and the Man-gwa are intended for instruction, and may almost be termed school-books. They are intended to pass from hand to hand, to be useful to young people, artists, and more particularly to artisans.

It is impossible to repeat too often that the union of the arts— smaller and greater — is perfect in Japan; the study of nature is their common base. Drawing is thus the foundation of the industrial arts themselves. In the famous epoch of Genroku (1688-1704), Korin, a thoroughly impressionist artist, and making lacquer himself, gave designs for lacquer-makers.

5 His family revived the Ceramic Art. They who engraved sword-guards were painters in their way ; and such were the designers for the cotton-weavers and embroiderers- — Moronobu, Goshin, Toyokuni. Hokusai himself gave models for china- manufacturers, lacquerers, and decorators of every sort.

Let us see Hokusai such as he is, when depicted by him- self in a little preface which he wrote, and which is just what we can imagine of him. “Since I was six years old,” says the painter, “ I have been in the habit of drawing the shapes of objects. Towards my fiftieth year I published an infinity of designs ; but I am not satisfied with anything I produced before my sixtieth year. It is at my seventieth year that I am more or less able to understand the forms of birds, fishes, etc.

Wild Geese, taken from The Hundred Views of Fujiyama, by Hokusai.

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

This preface finishes in the hope that — “at the age of a hundred and ten everything from my brush, whatever it is, may be full of life.”

Let us picture him to ourselves at the edge of a rice-field, out for a walk, enveloped in fog, or leaning out of his window. The world seems to him a diorama. Exterior objects all strike him with an almost equal intensity ; he has not the idea of things that are worth and that are not worth reproducing— he loves all things equally ; and all he sees, feels, breathes, dreams, he draws on paper.

He jots it down, and then has it en- graved. With us this would be con- sidered presumption. It is not so with him in Japan. When one of his portfolios was full, he made of it a volume of the Man-gwa , and number- less artisans took advantage of his great talent.

It is from the Man-gwa and similar collections that the endless variety of ornamentation on Japanese nicknacks of modern make is borrowed.

According to thoroughly trustworthy authorities, Hokusai commenced about 1810 the series of the Maii-gwa. According to his idea, the first volume was destined for his pupils and for schools and workmen. He was not well known at this date as a painter. On the very finest paper, fastened to a block of cherry-wood, he sketched down all that passed through his mind, without ambition, without interest, without haste. It took him thirty

years* to publish the four- teen volumes of the Man- gwa, designing at the same time an immense quantity

* The first volume is dated 1S14, and the second, third, and fourth all appeared in order after that. From the fifth onwards Hokusai was assisted by his son-in-law and one or two pupils. No. 8 dates from 1819, and Nos. 11 and 12 are after 1830. Nos. 13 and 14, interrupted by the death of the artist, were published in 1849 and 1851.

Taken from The Hundred Views of Fujiyama , by Hokusai.

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

Ey Keisai Yeisen.

notice of

of illustrations for the principal bookseller in Yedo. But the success of the Man-gwa was phenomenal.

With three tints— a black, a soft grey, and sometimes a light brick-red — three little cups placed by his side, the artist produced effects perfectly imitating nature. It seems — and on this subject we should like further knowledge — that the Japanese painter had some particular education of the eye, and that he was aided by it and a trained and carefully-instructed memory.

This will explain the apparent emptiness of his outlines, the simpleness of his decorations, and the dreamy look of his drawing of solid objects. One notices the same with artists wrho get quite familiar with some subject and then turn their back on it in order to reproduce it better. In fact, their eye is naturally photographic, and takes, as it were, a twofold objects.

Let us glance at the “ rapid sketches.” Grotesque and grinning gods, scenes of every-day life, pleasant and otherwise — types of artisans, jesters, conjurors, jugglers, beggars, bathers, travellers, birds, beasts, fishes, insects, and flowers — views of mountains and seascapes, studies of trees and grasses, build- ings, and landscapes ; these, although only in one volume, are almost a summary of the whole series ; and there are more than three hundred sketches on fifty pages. It is, in fact, an entire review of the Japanese people. The personages and the objects represented are hardly two inches high, and are thrown carelessly from top to bottom of the pages, without

ground to stand on or background to give them relief. But they are in such thoroughly natural attitudes, each having its peculiar movement and charac- teristics, that they seem ready to move, and one may truly say they appear full of life. In this first volume of the Man-gwa , too, that

Bridge, by Hiroshige.

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

deep sense of humour, which is one of the most striking traits of the Japanese and which Hokusai shared so strongly that it is shown on every page of his illustrations, is most strongly revealed.

In quickly analysing the subsequent volumes, we may mention, in No. 2, dragons, reptiles, recluses working miracles, scenes of manufacturing business, wrestling contests, physiognomies reproduced in masks, effects of snow clouds, the aurora borealis, natural curiosities, rare animals— a museum of endless variety without method or choice.

In No. 3, semi-human monsters, a terrible figure of a' Japanese Gorgon, chaotic landscapes and hideous combinations of the elements evolved in a delirium unknown to us.

No. 4 appears to be one of the most interesting, with its demonology, its sketches of trees seen by night, full of snow, whipped by the wind, beaten by the rain, and with its airy landscapes, mingled with clever reproduc-

Somehow it seems as if they had 1

copied from Chinese models. This, als noticeable in No. 6 ; but this number contains wonderful studies of movement- handsome horses, and a whole collection of \ fencing, shooting with cross-bows, and wrestl

No. 5 contains pages full of theatrical scenes, romantic pictures, and striking views of architec- ture gathered together on some journey.

tions of life.

No. 7 contains hardly anything beside landscapes and aspects of nature. One finds in it geological curiosities and quaint effects of cloud and fog, far-stretching landscapes, and bird’s - eye views of whole countries. It belongs to the sore of book called Meisho — a species of traveller’s guide-book which teaches one all that is to be considered interesting: in a country.

Every province has its Meisho ; and Hokusai 'himself, when he designed the

Taken fropi Yoshivara , by Outamaro.

MUM, JU

ARTISTIC JAPAN.

Ftigaku Hyakukei , or The Hundred Views of Fuji, did not intend to do more than add a volume to this series of picturesque guides.

In No. 8 there are some very remarkable grotesque faces, and some studies of very fat and very thin men, which are full of vitality ; in No. io some very graceful figures of women, some battles, and some imaginary battle-scenes. Hokusai now enlarged the size of his books, and produced some genuine works of art.

There is in No. io a wonderful series of prodigies shown at fairs, and little people making speeches ; and besides these, my- thological creatures that make one’s flesh creep, and many fanciful drolleries

— in fact, a surprising collection of the real and the unreal. In the nth and 12th numbers is a capital collection of painters at work, actors, clowns, men making grimaces with hideous appearance.

Lastly, Nos. 13 and 14 are quite up to the standard of the rest ; no weariness shows itself — one finds the same lovely figures and charming landscapes sketched with the same firmness, with the same freeness of hand which characterises the former numbers.

ARY RENAN.

By Toyokuni.

( To be continued in No. 9.)

90

Fishers, by Hokusai.

DESCRIPTION OF PLATES.

Plate EF is taken from the first volume of the Man-gwa, by Hokusai. From the same source we have already taken other plates for this Magazine.

Hundreds of pages might be reproduced before the limit could be found of this wonderful collection, with its endless variety of subjects, of which every one is so lively and so true in its feeling that the most inexperienced eye grasps its character at once. On the page under notice — at the top, to the left — is a man stirring some compound, the odour of which seems by no means to please his neighbour. Next, we see a young woman engaged in the arrange- ment of her hair — always a most complicated business for a Japanese lady, and which, in the case of the working classes, is not always undertaken every day. Most elaborate preparations are made, including a good wash of the oil of camellia, and the hair is made sufficiently greasy to remain unruffled for some long time, even during the night, when the head is supported by a pillow — most inappropriately thus named, for it is in fact a little curved block of wood which is placed horizontally under the nape of the neck. Against the toilet-box, placed in front of the lady, there rests the metal mirror, of which, in the drawing, one only sees the curved top.

Next, is a peaceable personage listening in an attitude of philosophic resignation to his some- what severe wife ; while, in another familiar scene, a good-natured father, pretending to be some hideous monster, only partially succeeds in frightening a knowing little lad, who, covering his eyes behind the broad sleeves of his coat, laughs loudly. Now comes a performer on the samisen, with his face hidden by means of a mask made of a piece of paper, with holes cut for his nose and eyes. A procession of pilgrims, with the great hats they regularly wear, is seen walking away from the spectator. A juggler is catching a saké bottle and drinking-cups, and beside him a Samurai seems to equal him in dexterity, for he is doing the conjuror with the lance of his honoured Daimio.

The other portion of the page, always commencing from the left —