TORII KIYONOBU.TORII KIYONOBU.
TORII KIYONOBU.
Kiyonobu I, the founder of the Torii line, was born in 1664 and died in 1729. It is said that he was first a resident of Osaka, and then of Kyoto; and that he finally came to Yedo about the beginning of the gay and brilliant Genroku Period, 1688-1703. Thus he must have been in Yedo a few years before the death of Moronobu in 1795, and it is evident that he studied the Moronobu style. Kiyonobu's father is variously reported to have been either an actor or a painter of theatrical sign-posters; at any rate his connection with the theatre was a close one. This circumstance doubtless determined the line of the son's activityin designing. About 1700 Kiyonobu produced the first single-sheet actor-print in black and white only. From this it was only a step to the production oftan-ye, which he probably invented—actor-sheets simply but brilliantly coloured by the application of orange to certain portions of the picture. In this manner he issued bothhoso-ye(that is, sheets about 12 inches high and 6 inches wide) and sheets of larger size, perhaps the most striking being actor-portraits, sometimes several feet in height, which enjoyed an immense popularity. By about 1715 he had taken up a more delicate kind of hand-colouring known askurenai-ye, which some writers think he himself devised. A few years later he adopted theurushi-yetechnique, increasing the number of colours and using lacquer to heighten the brilliancy of the effect.
Kiyonobu's subjects comprised a few landscapes of no great interest, and figures of several types. Hisfortewas the representation of actors and heroes of history. His bold and gigantic style of drawing lends some probability to the story that he was, when he first came to Yedo, a painter of huge theatrical sign-boards or posters for the exteriors of theatres. The same manner that would be appropriate for these is found in his prints—arresting, forceful, highly exaggerated. His designs must be regarded as establishing for all later times the general type to be used in actor-portraits. This constitutes his greatest historical importance.
The prints which appear to be Kiyonobu's earliest are marked by an extraordinary development of line,handled in great sweeping strokes. The brushwork is indicated with much dash andbravura, in the manner of the painter as distinct from the print-designer. A hasty glance might lead one to mistake some of these early compositions for the work of a Kwaigetsudō, though they are, as a rule, more uncouth.
Although power of line always remains one of Kiyonobu's characteristics, there appears in his later work a certain insistence on spaces, a treatment of the surface of the print as if it were a placque into which were to be inlaid large flat masses of a different substance. The robes are broken up into definite segments with sharp boundaries like parts of a picture puzzle, instead of remaining a surface on which to display the splintering vigour of brush-strokes. This second style is admirably adapted to the technique of wood-engraving.
The geometrical quality of some of Kiyonobu's designs is striking. There are several of his largetan-yein which the whole print is nothing more than a series of great circles, brought into relation with each other, as part of the decoration of the drapery, by wild and whirling brush-strokes.
The work of Kiyonobu varies greatly in attractiveness. Some of his prints have more force than beauty; and it requires little effort to understand the contempt of the aristocracy for these crude manifestations of the mob's taste. Yet even in these grosser designs Kiyonobu realizes the power and passion of the dramatic rôle which he depicts, achieving an effect of tragic rage that is no lessintense and impressive because of its lack of subtlety. Most of his prints suggest the shout and roar of bombast: this is precisely what they were meant to convey. But there are a few of another type, that embody the masterful power of line of the first Torii, joined with a simplicity and refinement of design which his work frequently lacked, or which, if present, is disguised from us by the repellent violence of the figure portrayed. One must see Kiyonobu's rarest and greatest prints in order to realize why he is regarded as so great an artist.
I have written of Kiyonobu as if he presented no difficulties; but such is not the case. A stumbling-block for the student is created by the fact that there exist many two-colour prints signed Kiyonobu. It is recorded that Kiyonobu died in 1729, many years before the date fixed upon by Fenollosa and most other authorities as the date of the invention of colour-printing. If we are to believe that the numerous colour-prints signed Kiyonobu are by the first Torii, we must either put back the date of the invention of colour-printing to an extent that is improbable in view of other facts, or we must abandon the recorded date of Kiyonobu's death and regard his life as having extended well beyond the middle of the eighteenth century. Formerly this difficulty was not appreciated, and all work signed Kiyonobu was confidently attributed to the first Torii; but at present it is generally regarded as likely that there was a second Kiyonobu who produced all the two-colour prints signed with thatname. Whether he produced any hand-coloured prints is uncertain. This Kiyonobu II theory has met with scepticism in certain quarters, and some students prefer to accept the alternative of one of the two other possible solutions of the puzzle. Certain differences in style between the hand-coloured and the two-colour work confirm the Kiyonobu II theory to such an extent that I have felt constrained to adopt it here. It may be disproved eventually, but it is the best solution available at present. I shall therefore take up Kiyonobu II as a separate artist, without again drawing attention to the unsettled state of the relation between him and Kiyonobu I.
TORII KIYOMASU.TORII KIYOMASU.
TORII KIYOMASU.
Kiyomasu, the second head of the Torii School, has been variously regarded as the brother or the son of the first Torii. The question of this exact relationship is a matter scarcely worth all the words that have been wasted upon it. What is important is the well-known fact that the two kinsmen worked side by side in the same studio for many years producing work of precisely the same type. The most experienced judges would find it impossible in some cases to distinguish between their productions.
Kiyomasu was born about 1679; some authoritiessay 1685; but if it is true, as Von Seidlitz states, that there exists a play-bill by him which is dated 1693, the earlier of the two dates is the only possible one. Since Kiyonobu was born in 1664, the theory that they were brothers is the more probable. Kiyomasu's chief work was done contemporaneously with Kiyonobu's, in black and white,tan-ye, andurushi-ye; but later he produced some prints in two colours. His subjects were chiefly women and actors; he executed a few small landscapes and some fine representations of birds. His work must have continued some years after 1743, but appears to have terminated a considerable time before his death in 1763 or 1764.
A more prolific artist than the first Torii, Kiyomasu was in some particulars an equally distinguished one. Possibly his originality was less marked in that he merely followed the actor type which had already been created by Kiyonobu; but in the power of his draughtsmanship, reminding one again and again of a tempered Kwaigetsudō, he is no secondary figure. Nothing can surpass the vigour of linework in some of his large figure prints—great curves made with a heavily charged brush, expressing with notable simplicity the beauty of flowing drapery. His masterpiece is undoubtedly that superb figure in black and white of the actor Kanto Koroku (in the Buckingham Collection, Chicago), drawn in the Moronobu-Kwaigetsudō manner, which is reproduced in Fenollosa's "Epochs of Chinese and Japanese Art" with the erroneous attribution of Kiyonobu. This print is a triumph. Nothing finer was designed by all the succeeding generations of artists.
Kiyonobu II, who signed all his work simply Kiyonobu, was a son of Kiyomasu, and probably a nephew of Kiyonobu I. His whole name was Torii Kiyonobu Shirō. He appears to have worked chiefly from about 1740 to about 1756, the period of the predominance of the two-colour print. All two-colour prints signed Kiyonobu are by this artist and not by the first Torii, who died before the process was invented. Kiyonobu II is regarded by many collectors as the best representative of the two-colour technique. His figures have a delicacy and grace that is alien to the work of his two predecessors in the Torii School; and his handling of the green and rose designs of these prints is charming. The great insistent colour masses and monumental figures of his predecessors undergo a change in his hands to a more detailed division of colours and a slightening of the forms of the bodies and limbs. Also the old passionate vigour of brushwork disappears in the new technique—a loss that seems a grave one.
Most writers speak of Kiyonobu II as a two-colour artist only. It is, however, fairly established that at least one of theurushi-yesigned Kiyonobu is by Kiyonobu II. That he did a few three-colour prints is certain. His work, like that of all these early men, is rare. It is particularly difficult to find examples of hisbeni-yethat are in good condition, since the rose-colour has in most cases entirely faded.
Kiyotadawas one of the best known and one of the most brilliant of the numerous followers of the great Torii pioneers. He is said to have been a pupil of Kiyonobu I. His period of production began not far from 1715, and ended before the invention of two-colour printing. His prints are alltan-yeorurushi-ye, some of them slightly like Okumura Masanobu in style. Certain of hishoso-yehave fascinating curves and superb colour—red, yellow, green, pink, and black, woven together into rich combinations.
Kiyoshigeproduced very fine actor-portraits coloured by hand, which remind one distinctly of Kiyonobu I in his later period. Large masses of colour are used by him with powerful decorative effect; and the geometrical designs of his textiles are sometimes striking. Kiyoshige's work has a strong yet graceful quality that makes him worthy of more attention than he has hitherto received. He lived to produce some two-colour prints. Dr. Kurth believes him to have been the first to use the pillar-print form for actor-portraits. His working period was from about 1720 to about 1759.
Hanegawa Chinchōwas an eccentric and interesting figure, who, though a pupil of Kiyonobu I, appears to have been more closely related to the Kwaigetsudō School than to the Torii. Born about 1680 he, by birth a Samurai, became a Ronin, and entered the studio of Kiyonobu. He was erratic, proud, and isolated. In spite of his pressing poverty,he worked at print-designing only when it pleased him to do so, which was seldom; and though he lived until 1754, his output was small. He was a poet and an aristocrat. His single-sheet prints have a curious esoteric quality—strange, stiff, beautiful curves that are not quite like the work of any other designer. Chinchō's work is of extraordinary rarity; there can scarcely be more than a score of his prints in existence.
Hanekawa-Wagenis represented by two prints in the Buckingham Collection. Nothing is known of him.
Kiyotomo, whose work appears to fall entirely within the period of hand-coloured prints, produced excellent actor designs, in some of which the line-work reminds one slightly of Kwaigetsudō. The influence of Kiyomasu appears in some of hisurushi-ye. His prints are distinguished by their vigour and are found but seldom.
Sanseido Tanaka Masunobuproduced hand-coloured and two-colour prints in the Torii manner. A print by him dated 1746 is known, but most of his work precedes 1740. He is not to be confused with the Masunobu who was Harunobu's pupil.
Kiyosomois said to have been a distinguished pupil of Kiyonobu I, influenced also by Okumura Masanobu.
Other men of this period, closely connected with the Torii School, were: Kiyoake, Kondo Sukegoro Kiyoharu, Katsukawa Terushige, Nishikawa Terunobu, Nishikawa Omume, Fujikawa Yoshinobu, Tamura Yoshinobu, Tamura Sadanobu, KichikawaKatsumasa, Kiyomizu Mazunobu, Shimizu Mitsunobu, Kondo Kiyonobu, Kondo Katsunobu, Kiyorō, Tadaharu, and Nakaji Sadatoshi.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: COURTESANS AT TOILET.OKUMURA MASANOBU: COURTESANS AT TOILET.Black and white. 10 × 15. Unsigned.Plate 4.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: COURTESANS AT TOILET.Black and white. 10 × 15. Unsigned.
Plate 4.
OKUMURA MASANOBU.OKUMURA MASANOBU.
OKUMURA MASANOBU.
A Figure.
Garbed in flowing folds of light,Azure, emerald, rose, and white,Watchest thou across the night.Crowned with splendour is thine head;All the princes great and deadRound thy limbs their state have shed—Calm, immutable to stand,Gracious head and poisèd hand,O'er the years that flow like sand.
Garbed in flowing folds of light,Azure, emerald, rose, and white,Watchest thou across the night.
Crowned with splendour is thine head;All the princes great and deadRound thy limbs their state have shed—
Calm, immutable to stand,Gracious head and poisèd hand,O'er the years that flow like sand.
Okumura Masanobu may be termed the central figure of this period: not only does he tower among the greatest men of the time, but around him revolve the changes in technique, full of far-reaching consequences, which came into being with his invention of two-colour printing.
Furthermore, he takes on an additional historical importance as the founder of the Okumura School, which continued parallel with the Torii School, and whose productions are characterized by a finer development of grace and elegance than is to be found in the output of the rival line.
Masanobu was born about 1685, and lived until about 1764—a life of very nearlyeighty years, full of varied achievements. During the course of his career he used many names, among which Genpachi, Hōgetsudō, Tanchōsai, Bunkaku, and Kammyō are the most frequent. Little is known of his life except that he began as a bookseller in Yedo. He is reputed to have been a pupil of Kiyonobu, but Mr. Arthur Morrison believes this to be an error, and thinks that Masanobu was an independent artist educated in no one of the Yedo schools. Whichever account may be correct, it is at least certain that Masanobu shows in his work few traces of resemblance to the first of the Torii masters. It is equally clear that he was early and strongly influenced by the work of Moronobu, who died when Masanobu was only ten years old, but whose designs were of course still widely known. It is said that soon after 1707 Masanobu founded a publishing establishment in connection with his book-shop, issuing prints as well as books. This must have afforded him great opportunities for experiments in technique, and may have been no small factor in making possible the remarkable advances for which he was responsible.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: STANDING WOMAN.OKUMURA MASANOBU: STANDING WOMAN.Black outlines, with hand-colouring of black lacquer, orange, yellow, and gold powder. Size 13½ × 6.SignedYamato no Gwako, Okumura Masanobu, hitsu.Plate 5.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: STANDING WOMAN.Black outlines, with hand-colouring of black lacquer, orange, yellow, and gold powder. Size 13½ × 6.SignedYamato no Gwako, Okumura Masanobu, hitsu.
Plate 5.
HŌGETSUDŌ.HŌGETSUDŌ.
HŌGETSUDŌ.
Masanobu's earliest works were book-illustrations and albums, which closely follow the manner of Moronobu.Plate 4reproduces one of these.Parallel with them he produced a number oftan-ye, the large single-sheet prints in black and white, which, after printing, were coloured by hand with orange pigment. These probably date from before 1720, although exactness cannot be hoped for. About 1720 he began to do work in a medium which he is said to have invented—theurushi-ye, or lacquer-prints, in which the lacquer gives a new richness and luminosity to the various colours. An example of these appears inPlate 5. The device of heightening the effect by applying gold powder to certain portions of the design was also employed by him. A play of light that is extraordinarily fascinating often marks his combinations of colours. By about 1742 a new technical advance, the most vital in the whole history of the art, came into existence; and Masanobu is generally credited with its invention. This was the employment of two blocks beside the black key-block to print two other colours upon the paper. The importance of this step was immeasurable: when it was taken the doom of the hand-coloured print was sealed, and the way to still further development lay open. At first the colours used by Masanobu in his two-colour works were a delicate apple-green and the equally delicate rose calledbeni, from which the namebeni-yecame to be applied to all the two-colour prints of this period. A print of this type appears inPlate 6. The combination of these two colours is singularly lovely, and the fresh charm of these sheets has led some collectors to prize them as the most beautiful products of the art.
Certainly Masanobu's mastery of the problem of producing a rich and vivacious colour-composition by the use of only two colours is noteworthy. By varying the size and shape of his colour masses, and by a judicious use of the white of the paper and the black of the key-block, he produces an effect of such colour-fullness that it requires a distinct effort of the mind to convince oneself that these prints are designs in two tones only, and not full-colour prints. Masanobu lived long enough to produce some three-colour prints, when these were devised about 1755, but the effects he obtained in them were possibly less fascinating than those of his earlier process.
It can probably never be proven that Masanobu was, in fact, the inventor of all the devices that were attributed to him—the lacquer-print, thebeniprint, the use of gold powder, and the first actual prints in colour. Certainly some of them may be credited to him; but any one familiar with the growth of hero-legends knows how a great name attracts to itself in popular report achievements that were really the fruit of scattered lesser men. To the list of Masanobu's probable inventions must be added the pillar-print, that remarkable type, about 4 to 6 inches wide and 25 to 40 inches high, which was to be an important form of design from this date on. It is possible that we must also attribute to him the invention of the mica background—that silver surface of powdered mica which give a curious and beautiful tone to the figures outlined against it.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: YOUNG NOBLEMAN PLAYING THE DRUMOKUMURA MASANOBU: YOUNG NOBLEMAN PLAYING THE DRUM.Printed in black, green, and rose. Size 12 × 6.SignedHogetsudo Okumura Masanobu, hitsu. Chandler Collection.Plate 6.
OKUMURA MASANOBU: YOUNG NOBLEMAN PLAYING THE DRUM.Printed in black, green, and rose. Size 12 × 6.SignedHogetsudo Okumura Masanobu, hitsu. Chandler Collection.
Plate 6.
Of Masanobu as a designer it is difficult to speak with moderation. Through his work runs that sweeping power of line which he derived from his study of Moronobu, and, in addition, an elegance and suave grace that is the expression of his innate grace of spirit. The grandeur of certain others of the Primitives is austere and harsh, but Masanobu is always mellow and harmonious. His figures, more finely proportioned than most of the figures of the period, sway in easy motion—a mixture of sweetness and distinction characterizes the poised heads, superb bodies, and ample draperies of his women, while every resource of compact and dignified design is expended upon the impressive figures of his men. A certain large geniality, a wide, sunlighted warmth of conception, runs through his work. The dramatic distortions of his Torii predecessors and contemporaries are melted in him, as towering but uncouth icebergs melt in the sun of kindlier latitudes. At times his line-work has a force that seems derived from the Kwaigetsudō tradition; more often it is imbued with a gentler rhythm no less expressive of strength. In his finest designs he achieves notable balance of line, and a massing of colour beside which, as Fenollosa remarks, "even the facades of Greek temples were possibly cold and half-charged in comparison."
Women, out-of-door scenes, and a few actors, constitute the main subjects of Masanobu's work. As a portraitist, his few productions, such as the well-known humorous pillar-print of the story-teller Koshi Shikoden, give him rank as the greatest of histime. The landscape backgrounds in some of his smaller prints are a delightful innovation, executed with delicate power of suggesting by a few strokes the whole circle of a natural setting. The quiet charm of these landscapes surrounds with an atmosphere of felicity the beautiful figures that move through them.
A full and brilliant life stirs in all Masanobu's work. At no other period in the history of Ukioye was such effective use made of the patterns of draperies. The elaborate fashions of the brocades worn in this day lent themselves to the decorative needs of the larger prints; and frequently we find the figures clothed in a riot of striking textiles—flowers, trees, birds, ships, geometrical shapes—all mingled in the weave of the cloth, and arranged by the print-designer into a combination that is tumultuous without confusion and glowing without garishness. Masanobu's pictures seem the overflow of his spirit's wealth; they never have the ascetic and rarefied quality that sometimes appears in the work of even great artists.
Masanobu's work is scarce. His larger and more important prints very rarely appear outside of the great collections.
Okumura Toshinobu, a son of Masanobu who died young, was the best as well as the most famous of Masanobu's pupils. He gave promise of becoming one of the notable print-designers, and even in his short career produced work of high quality. Bornabout 1709, his period of production covered the years of the lacquer-prints, and ended before 1743. Hisurushi-ye, lithe in design and powerful in colouring, constitute almost his whole known work.
Okumura Masafusa, Shuseido, Hanekawa Chiucho Motonobu, and Mangetsudō may be mentioned as other and less important pupils of Masanobu.
Nishimura Shigenobu is an artist about whom there is great confusion. He is variously called the father, the son, or the pupil of the better-known artist Shigenaga: the first of these alternatives is the most probable. Nothing is known of Shigenobu's life, and very little of his work is extant. Kurth says that Shigenobu founded the Nishimura School, and worked in the manner of the earliest Torii. Von Seidlitz believes that he did some work in the Kwaigetsudō manner. Fenollosa dates his work 1720-40, and thinks that he worked first like the Torii, then like Masanobu. At present it seems impossible to gather further information about this interesting artist.
Nishimura Shigenaga was at one time regarded as the inventor of the two-colour process; but now that the weight of opinion attributes this invention to Masanobu, Shigenaga remains a figure whose importance is hardly diminished. He must still be regarded as perhaps the most notable master of the Nishimura School, both as a designer and as theteacher of a group of pupils whose brilliancy is equalled by the disciples of no other artist.
Shigenaga was born in 1697 and lived until 1756. He used the names Senkwadō and Magosaburō as well as his own. Little is known of him personally, except that he was probably the son of Shigenobu.
NISHIMURA SHIGENAGA.NISHIMURA SHIGENAGA.
NISHIMURA SHIGENAGA.
His work began with black-and-white prints in the manner of Kiyonobu; these were already something of an anachronism at the date when he commenced his designing. He then turned tourushi-ye, and produced some beautiful examples. About 1742, when the two-colour process was invented, he made himself one of the most successful masters of it. Dr. Anderson reproduces, as the frontispiece of his "Japanese Wood-Engraving," a fine example of Shigenaga's work in this technique, but erroneously dates it as 1725—more than fifteen years too early. Shigenaga also did fine work in the three-colour process, of which he may possibly have been the inventor. His designs comprise not only women and actors, but also landscapes, flowers, animals, and birds. His versatility is one of his most striking characteristics.
It was from the style of Masanobu that Shigenaga drew his most lasting stimulus; and among his sheets we shall find many a figure worthy to stand beside his master's serene creations. Dr. Kurth callshim a "faded or weakened Masanobu"; but this term can be applied with justice to only a portion of Shigenaga's work. His productions are uneven; part are indeed somewhat tame; but certain of his designs rise to a high level. His finest works, which are rare, are his figures of graceful women in the Masanobu manner. But he was no mere imitator. The Masanobu poise, the Masanobu flow and patterning of garments he did, it is true, adopt; but with how fresh and sensitive a life does he infuse them!
Shigenaga's pupils comprise most of the great men of the succeeding generation Toyonobu, Harunobu, Koriusai, Shigemasa, Toyoharu, and many others learned from him the elements of their art. Thus Shigenaga may be regarded as the most important bridge between the Primitives and the later men, passing over to them the traditions of the older schools together with the stimulus of that fresh, inventive, and assimilative spirit which was peculiarly his own.
Among the less important pupils or associates of Shigenaga may be named the following artists:—
Tsunegawa Shigenobuproduced work much like Shigenaga's; in the few prints of his which I have seen there is grace and ease, but not great strength. His work appears to have been mainly inurushi-ye. Mr. Gookin believes this name to be merely the early name of Nishimura Shigenobu.
Yōsendō YasunobuorAnshin, by whom a fine lacquer-print with strong blacks is in theSpaulding Collection, may, with some hesitancy, be classed here. Mr. Gookin thinks this signature may be merely one of the studio names of some more famous artist.
Nagahide, dated by Strange about 1760, appears to belong to this group. The Harmsworth Collection, London, contains a print by him representing famous theatrical characters depicted by geisha, the colours partly printed and partly applied by hand.
Harutoshiis known to me only by one pillar-print, in the manner of Shigenaga's actors. It is doubtful where he should be classified.
Akiyama Sadaharu,Hirose Shigenobu, andRyūkwado Ichiichido Shigenobuwere obscure pupils of Shigenaga.
Yamamoto Yoshinobuis said by Fenollosa to have been a pupil of Shigenaga, and possibly the same asKomai Yoshinobu, who is treated later under Harunobu. Dr. Kurth thinks him a member of a Yamamoto School, which comprised alsoYamamoto Denroku,Yamamoto Shigenobu,Yamamoto Shigefusa,Yamamoto Fujinobu,Yamamoto Shigeharu,Tomikawa Ginsetsualso known asFusanobu,Yamamoto Maruya Kyūyeimon,Yamamoto Kuzayeimon, andYamamoto Rihei.
TOYONOBU: TWO KOMUSO, REPRESENTED BY THE ACTORS SANOKAWA ICHIMATSU AND ONOYE KIKUGORO.TOYONOBU: TWO KOMUSO, REPRESENTED BY THE ACTORS SANOKAWA ICHIMATSU AND ONOYE KIKUGORO.Printed in black and three colours. Size 15 × 10.SignedTanjodo, Ishikawa Shuha Toyonobu ga. Chandler Collection.Plate 7.
TOYONOBU: TWO KOMUSO, REPRESENTED BY THE ACTORS SANOKAWA ICHIMATSU AND ONOYE KIKUGORO.Printed in black and three colours. Size 15 × 10.SignedTanjodo, Ishikawa Shuha Toyonobu ga. Chandler Collection.
Plate 7.
A Pillar Print.
O lady of the long robes, the slow folds flowing—Lady of the white breast, the dark and lofty head—Dwells there any wonder, the way that thou art going—Or goest thou toward the dead?So calm thy solemn steps, so slow the long lines sweepingOf garments pale and ghostly, of limbs as grave as sleep—I know not if thou, spectre, hast love or death in keeping,Or goest toward which deep.Thou layest thy robes aside with gesture large and flowing.Is it for love or sleep—is it for life or death?I would my feet might follow the path that thou art going,And thy breath be my breath.
O lady of the long robes, the slow folds flowing—Lady of the white breast, the dark and lofty head—Dwells there any wonder, the way that thou art going—Or goest thou toward the dead?
So calm thy solemn steps, so slow the long lines sweepingOf garments pale and ghostly, of limbs as grave as sleep—I know not if thou, spectre, hast love or death in keeping,Or goest toward which deep.
Thou layest thy robes aside with gesture large and flowing.Is it for love or sleep—is it for life or death?I would my feet might follow the path that thou art going,And thy breath be my breath.
Ishikawa Toyonobu, who not many years ago was regarded as an artist of secondary importance, has of late, thanks to fresh discoveries, come to be esteemed by competent observers as one of the giants of the line—one of those masters among the Primitives whose dignity of composition makes all but a handful of his successors appear petty beside him.
ISHIKAWA TOYONOBU.ISHIKAWA TOYONOBU.
ISHIKAWA TOYONOBU.
This important artist, who sometimes signed himself Shuha, was, like so many other of the better men of his time, a pupil of Shigenaga. In his early work we find him influenced by the suave and noble figures of Okumura Masanobu more than by the figures of his direct master. Born in 1711, Toyonobu lived until 1785; and the long space of his life thus extended beyond the period of the Primitives and into the period of polychrome printing. Nevertheless his real activity terminated with the end of the Primitive Period. His earliest work was in black-and-whiteor hand-coloured; from this he passed on to two-colour prints, a manner in which he produced manyhoso-yeof flawless grace; and then into three-colour prints, in which his most important work was accomplished, and "whose classic master," as Kurth says, "he may be called." Between 1755 and 1764, the great period of the three-colour print, Toyonobu stood almost unmatched in the field. A fine example of his work appears inPlate 7. After 1764 the ascendancy of Harunobu eclipsed Toyonobu; even the classic style of the older master could not match the brilliant and popular innovations of Harunobu's "brocade pictures." He was therefore driven to take up the technique of full-colour printing. In one print he gives us figures like those of Koriusai; in another he follows Harunobu with the most complete exactness. Though forced to the wall, the old giant could still fight his rivals, and with their own weapons.
The works of Toyonobu's prime—particularly his pillar-prints—produce a singular impression of lofty greatness. His line-arrangements have always a magical serenity and balance, and the repose of his compositions is equalled only by their strength. In these tall figures, where hauntingly lovely lines never degenerate into mere sweetness, there is a combination of rigour with suavity, of force with grace, that makes him forever memorable. His masterful precision, and the curiously "towering" effect which his figures produce, as in the Girl with the Umbrella reproduced inPlate 8, serve to mark him as one of the important representatives of the grand style in design.
TOYONOBU: GIRL OPENING AN UMBRELLA. TOYONOBU: WOMAN DRESSING.TOYONOBU: GIRL OPENING AN UMBRELLA.Black outlines, with hand-colouring.Size 27 × 6.SignedTanjodo Ishikawa Shuha Toyonobu zu.Metzgar Collection.TOYONOBU: WOMAN DRESSING.Printed in black and three colours.Size 27 × 4.SignedIshikawa Toyonobu hitsu.Plate 8.
TOYONOBU: GIRL OPENING AN UMBRELLA. TOYONOBU: WOMAN DRESSING.
TOYONOBU: GIRL OPENING AN UMBRELLA.Black outlines, with hand-colouring.Size 27 × 6.SignedTanjodo Ishikawa Shuha Toyonobu zu.Metzgar Collection.
TOYONOBU: WOMAN DRESSING.Printed in black and three colours.Size 27 × 4.SignedIshikawa Toyonobu hitsu.
Plate 8.
Perhaps more than any other artist of the Ukioye School, Toyonobu devoted himself to the drawing of the nude. These rare works are among the finest of his productions, and are so distinctly an exception to the general practice of Japanese artists that they call for special remark. Certain other painters also produced a few such pictures, but they must all be regarded as sporadic phenomena running counter to the characteristic Japanese feeling. The national temper recognizes feminine beauty in art only when clothed; and it is due solely to the profounder perception of a few great artists that any such designs have come down to us. One is moved to speculation over this curious fact, particularly when one considers that the sight of the body, at least among the lower classes, must have been almost as common in Japan at this time as it was in Greece during the great period of Athenian art. But very different was the reaction produced upon the two races by this familiarity. In the Greeks, it encouraged an art whose prime aim was to give expression to those harmonies and hints of perfection that lie hidden in the imperfections of each individual body; so that we have from the Greeks those syntheses and idealizations of the human form which still haunt us like faint memories of the gods. But in the Japanese mind, the sense of the individual defects seems to have overpowered the impulse to creative idealism; and the people, as a race, turned from the nude figure to the more easily manipulated beauties of flowing robes and gorgeous patterns, translating Nature into imagesof an alien richness, and love into hyperboles of public splendour. That part of Nature which lay outside themselves they could indeed cope with, as the lofty visions of landscape which they have transcribed testify; but with a few exceptions, such as Toyonobu and Kiyomitsu and Kiyonaga, they dared not attempt the final venture of rationalizing the uses and aspects of the body. And it is because of an inadequacy whose source and root spring from this attitude that posterity will perhaps rank this art below the art of Greece, adjudging even the matchless subtlety and refinement of these designs to be no adequate compensation for the absence of that frank Greek courage which attempted to clarify and ennoble the fundamental conditions of the existence of man.
Toyonobu, great artist that he was, overstepped the national barrier and came very near to surpassing the finest achievements of Greek art.
Pillar Print of a Woman.
A place for giant heads to take their restSeems her pale breast.Her sweeping robe trails like the cloud and windStorms leave behind.The ice of the year, and its Aprilian part,Sleep in her heart.Therefore small marvel that her footsteps beLike strides of Destiny!
A place for giant heads to take their restSeems her pale breast.
Her sweeping robe trails like the cloud and windStorms leave behind.
The ice of the year, and its Aprilian part,Sleep in her heart.
Therefore small marvel that her footsteps beLike strides of Destiny!
KIYOMITSU: THE ACTOR SEGAWA KIKUNOJO AS A WOMAN SMOKING.KIYOMITSU: THE ACTOR SEGAWA KIKUNOJO AS A WOMAN SMOKING.Printed in black and three colours. Size 11½ × 5½.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.Plate 9.
KIYOMITSU: THE ACTOR SEGAWA KIKUNOJO AS A WOMAN SMOKING.Printed in black and three colours. Size 11½ × 5½.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.
Plate 9.
Pillar Print of a Man.
Out of spaces hazed with greyness, out of years whose veils are grey,With the slow majestic footsteps of a lord of far-away,Comes a form that out of gloomingRises from some old entombingTo confront once more the day.And with splendid gesture dwarfing the confusion of our hands,With his ancient calm rebuking the unrest of vain demands,He with solemn footsteps slowlyPasses: and his garments holyLeave the scent of holy lands.
Out of spaces hazed with greyness, out of years whose veils are grey,With the slow majestic footsteps of a lord of far-away,Comes a form that out of gloomingRises from some old entombingTo confront once more the day.
And with splendid gesture dwarfing the confusion of our hands,With his ancient calm rebuking the unrest of vain demands,He with solemn footsteps slowlyPasses: and his garments holyLeave the scent of holy lands.
TORII KIYOMITSU.TORII KIYOMITSU.
TORII KIYOMITSU.
Kiyomitsu took his place as the third great head of the Torii line, succeeding his father Kiyomasu. In subject and in manner, it is the Torii tradition that he carries on. We know nothing of his life, save that he was born in 1735 and died in 1785. His work falls almost entirely within the class of two- and three-colour prints. I know of only one hand-coloured print by him; but as his dates denote, he lived far into the period of polychrome printing, and was a partaker in Harunobu's experiments in colour. Von Seidlitz is wrong in saying that no polychrome prints by Kiyomitsu are known; a few exist and are very beautiful. He did little work after 1765, and is to be regarded as most characteristically an artist of the Primitive Period—in fact one of the greatest. Certainly between 1755 and 1764, no onebut Toyonobu could rival him; and these two may be ranked the supreme designers of the three-colour epoch.
The outstanding feature of Kiyomitsu's work is its formalism. Whatever he touches is compressed to a pattern, and rendered into bold hieroglyphics of sweeping curves. His line is simple, powerfully dominated by a circular movement that is singularly and inexplicably delightful. His colours, even while they remain only two or three in number, never lack variety and strong decorative effect. The slightness of the use which he makes of black is noteworthy; he compensates for its absence by choosing heavy opaque colours of rich tone. Some authorities regard him as the first to employ a third colour-block.
Kiyomitsu's work is markedly stylistic—even dominated by a certain mannerism; one comes to recognize almost infallibly the formula he uses, and to regard as an old friend that peculiar swirl of drapery, swing of body, and artificial poise of head which appear, as inPlate 9, like an accepted convention throughout the larger number of his designs. The convention is an agreeable and highly æsthetic one, based on fundamental curves of great beauty. But the invariability with which he employs this formula gives Dr. Kurth some excuse for regarding him as a monotonous and over-estimated artist. Had we only Kiyomitsu'shoso-yeprints, it might be possible to agree with Dr. Kurth; for these figures, enchanting and full of elegance as they are, certainly are dominated by a sameness of manner such as one finds in no other series ofhoso-ye. Butthe truth of Dr. Kurth's depreciations must be questioned if one turns to the pillar-prints, which constitute the real glory of Kiyomitsu's career. The two reproduced inPlate 10exhibit his power. Kiyomitsu may be regarded as one of the half-dozen greatest masters of the pillar-print shape of composition. Much of his finest work is in this form. Here his somewhat tight curves lengthen out into flowing beauty; and the dignity always inherent in his drawing appears at its best.
KIYOMITSU: WOMAN WITH BASKET HAT.KIYOMITSU: WOMAN WITH BASKET HAT.Black and three colours.Size 28 × 4.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.KIYOMITSU: WOMAN COMING FROM BATH.Black and three colours.Size 27 × 4.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.Plate 10.
KIYOMITSU: WOMAN WITH BASKET HAT.
KIYOMITSU: WOMAN WITH BASKET HAT.Black and three colours.Size 28 × 4.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.
KIYOMITSU: WOMAN COMING FROM BATH.Black and three colours.Size 27 × 4.SignedTorii Kiyomitsu ga.
Plate 10.
Kiyomitsu's rare nudes take a place close beside those of Toyonobu. They have a keen poetic charm; and though their vigour is less marked than that of Toyonobu's, their grace and elegance of movement is at least as striking.
The collector may find it useful to remember that long after Kiyomitsu's death, Kiyomine and Kiyofusa sometimes used the great name of Kiyomitsu as a signature to their own works. Only an inexperienced observer could mistake these late and decadent productions for the work of the original master.
Torii Kiyohiro has been rated by some writers as more highly gifted than Kiyomitsu. This praise appears absurdly extravagant; yet in disputing such a claim, one must admit the great charm of Kiyohiro's work. He is said to have been a pupil of Kiyonobu II; his career runs parallel with that of Kiyomitsu, and he seems frequently to imitate that artist. The period of his greatest prominence was between 1745 and 1758; his work is all in two or three colours.A delicate draughtsman, his figures have marked grace of poise and firmness of design. His mannerism is less stereotyped than Kiyomitsu's; some of his prints have great beauty, but he never reaches certain heights which Kiyomitsu attained. Prints by him are uncommon.