The title of the exhibition, Edo Pop: Japanese prints , refers to the popular culture of Japan at the time. The exhibition delivers, with an extraordinary level of detail and compelling narratives, an intriguing world of urban celebrities, actors, sports champions, fashion icons and villains. Edo Pop features a Hokusai print from the same series as his famous image, the Great Wave. Accompanied by prints by other leading artists the exhibition will prove to visitors that there was much more to this richly creative city.
On loan from the private collection of art historian and writer, Frank Milner, the show features work by leading Japanese printmakers such as Eisen , Kuniyoshi , Kunisada , Yoshitoshi, Sadahide and Kunichika ; the last great master of the Kabuki actor print. It also reveals how trail-blazing and industrious the printing industry in Japan was in the 19th century.
The technically accomplished Ukiyo-e prints, often produced from 12 or more woodblocks, were issued in runs of up to of each image. People often think of Pop and its ephemera as a s thing but over years ago, in a wooden city of a million people on the other side of the world, there was a buzzing, exciting Pop culture and these beautifully-crafted prints show that.
Instead of crammed eight deep into my hallway they will now be given enough space to be able to really appreciate their unique qualities. The colourful prints depict a lively city on the brink of huge cultural changes. Split across several themes the exhibition reveals social customs, pastimes and lifestyle in a time when government censorship was strict. Women of the Yoshiwara β An 18 acre walled, guarded and gated zone on the edge of Edo, Yoshiwara was home to 3, prostitutes who lived and worked alongside geishas, teahouse and brothel servants and entertainers.
The small minority of those who reached the elevated oiran status were glamorous figures and fashion icons. Also the subject of urban gossip and curiosity, the prints of the beautifully-dressed women were best sellers and commonly pasted on walls of teahouses and hung in Japanese homes. Established in the late 17th century and hugely popular, by the 19th century, Kabuki theatre had turned its eye to contemporary Edo life.
