Japanese Prints and Illustrated Books in Context

Course Description

Japanese woodblock prints and illustrated books from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries are celebrated for their high technical and aesthetic achievements. In this course, we will look closely at both formats, putting these into their historical and cultural contexts. We will also think through how these materials were designed for their broad and largely literate audiences. By engaging a wide range of materials, we will consider how the goals for printed materials varied from transferring information to delineating artistic trends. Among the topics we’ll study are: the early forms of woodblock printing; the development of full-color multiple block printing; popular subjects, from kabuki actors to erotica; the book as medium of transfer of painting practices; and the role of tradition in a modern world. In considering this larger world of print, we will seek to understand how savvy publishers provoked and sated the appetites of their audiences by marketing writers and illustrators—along with many of their subjects—as brand names, even turning some into celebrities. These multi-market publishing ventures appeared as both inexpensive diversions, to be consumed and discarded, while others were designed for elite audiences, using high-quality materials, techniques, and references. Publishers also dabbled in job printing in the form of producing high-end works on commission for poetry groups, fan clubs, and others. In the modern era, these practices of the past were adapted by publishers, artists, and writers to serve their new markets. As we shall see, some projects reinscribed the bounds of traditional culture, while others embraced the broader range of representation offered by an international art world. Our course will include morning discussions followed by hands-on engagement with examples from the Kislak collections, as well as a session at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. We will also learn how these works were made, with sessions on Japanese papermaking, on materials, and on side-stitch pouch binding (also known as stab binding). In their personal statements, applicants are welcome to address any previous experience they have with East Asian material culture, but no background in Japanese culture or language is required or expected.

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Advance Reading List

Preliminary Advices

This course is designed as an introduction to the world of Japanese print culture.  Required readings are in ranked order from the top.

Required Readings

Chance, Linda H. and Julie Nelson Davis. “The Handwritten and the Printed: Issues of Format and Medium in Japanese Premodern Books.” Manuscript Studies 1:1 (2017), Article 6. Reconsiders how the handwritten as a form remained the preference in premodern Japanese books.

Davis, Julie Nelson. Picturing the Floating World: Ukiyo-e in Context. University of Hawai’i Press, 2021. Critical introduction to ukiyo-e (“pictures of the floating world.”) https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/picturing-the-floating-world-ukiyo-e-in-context/

The World of the Japanese Illustrated Book: The Gerhard Pulverer Collection. Please start by reading the overview essays and watching the videos. Then drop into the search function and check out some titles with the pull down tabs, clicking through until you get to the full page view. From there, please click on the description and contents tabs, looking at the cataloging terms and kinds of data collected for these books. Read some of the commentaries available on some entries; these can also be found by using the authors’ names as key terms in the search bar: Asano, Davis, Fowler, Hinohara, Suzuki Jun, Volk, Schoneveld, and many others, all listed in the contributor’s bios section of the website. Note that this site includes an extensive bibliography.

Marceau, Lawrence. “Behind the Scenes: Narrative and Self-referentiality in Edo Illustrated Popular Fiction.” Japan Forum: 21:3 (2010): 403–423. Translation of a comic story about the publisher’s practice.

Sherif, Ann. “Book Histories, Material Culture, and East Asian Studies.” Verge: Studies in Global Asias 3:1 (Spring 2017): 35–53. State of the field discussion.

Recommended for Further Reading

Berry, Mary Elizabeth. Japan in Print: Information and Nation in the Early Modern Period. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006. Thoughtful study of how printed matter created a new “library of public information.”

Davis, Julie Nelson. Partners in Print: Artistic Collaboration and the Ukiyo-e Market. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2015. Four case studies on kinds of collaboration in the later eighteenth century.

Meech, Julia and Jane Oliver, eds. Designed for Pleasure: The World of Edo Japan in Prints and Paintings, 1680–1860. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008. Exhibition catalogue with essays by leading scholars.

For Your Reference Collection

Hillier, Jack. The Art of the Japanese Book. London: Sotheby’s Publications, 1987. Classic work on the illustrated book.

Keyes, Roger. Ehon: The Artist and the Book in Japan. New York: New York Public Library, 2006. Exhibition catalogue.

Kornicki, Peter. The Book in Japan: A Cultural History from the Beginnings to the Nineteenth Century. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2000. Essential and carefully researched study.

June, Suzuki and Ellis Tinios. Understanding Japanese Woodblock-Printed Illustrated Books: A Short Introduction to their History, Bibliography and Format. Leiden & Boston: Brill, 2013. Practical handbook on the topic.

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Course Evaluations

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Course History