A history of Japanese illustration (一)

Precision. Complete dedication. The ability to let the imagination fly, but the discipline to concentrate for hours of painstaking process to produce sublime works that satisfy even the most self-critical of perfectionists. To understand the history of Japanese illustration, we must first recognise these characteristics recurrent in all areas of Japanese craftsmanship.

From the moment a child starts learning to draw the complex characters that form their written language, the Japanese inhabit a world of illustration. But we`re going to start with the forebear of modern Japanese illustration, the iconic ukiyo-e style that flourished in the Edo period from the 17th century onwards and ushered in a more dynamic, realistic style of illustration, capable of capturing both the fantastical and the everyday. They used a woodblock printing method, still the primary process for copying texts as the European printing press held little practical appeal for a language boasting over 100,000 different characters. These new artistic pieces, designed to be viewed and purchased by a wider audience than any other previous form of Japanese art, were not the work of one creator, but of a whole team of specialists, each experts in their craft.

The publisher provided the concept and the vision, the artist would ink the image’s lines on thin paper, the printer then pasted the paper onto the main omohan cherrywood block before tearing it off to leave an imprint for the engraver to start working on the lines with his kogatana knife and chisel. These outlines could be be under one millimetre thick, requiring the most skilled of touches from the carver. After the printer has cleaned and applied black sumi ink to the finished block, expertly-crafted washi paper is applied and rubbed with a baren to create the initial print. Further irohan blocks are carved and used for each colour before the work can finally be finished. Although the processes may be different today, the fine lines and depth of colour - born from absolute attention to detail at every step of the process - from these early masterpieces live on in contemporary Japanese illustration.

But for a fuller understanding, let’s go back a little further. Just as religion provided both the subject and the inspiration for so much early art all over the world, so the roots of Japanese illustration lie in the native Shinto and adopted Buddhist beliefs and imagery. The gods - or kami - of Shinto were not of the more corporeal Western tradition, but a constant presence within nature, embodied in rocks, trees, skies, stars, mountains, lakes, and rivers. So the religious portraiture that - as in other cultures - drove so much artistic development was often portraiture of landscapes - of the natural features within which the divine spirits resided. While more Western cultures focused on the bodily representations of figures in the religious canon, Japanese tended to give as much attention to the scenery that surrounded them, rubber-stamping the divinity of nature in the popular mind. This worship of nature became and remains a powerful force in the Japanese psyche, and their artists began to localise their imported Chinese style of illustration by introducing native animals, flora, fauna and other motifs, leading to the development of the distinctive yamato-e style.