The Nineteenth Century Japanese Print

by Kuniyoshi, ca. 1843-46

Mimasu Gennosuke

Out of Focus

The nineteenth century ukiyo-e, with the exception of those genres not fully developed in the eighteenth century - surimono, landscapes, and more recently warrior prints, asobi-e and fan prints - has never received the critical attention it justly deserves. And this is in spite of the fact that nineteenth century prints have long been extremely popular with collectors, and for some collectors constitute the sole focus of their interest in Japanese prints.

Surely, for every example of the vaunted eighteenth century print that remains on the market today there are at least one hundred nineteenth century pieces available. While this ratio draws some to the eighteenth century work for the sake of rarity alone, even if the surviving impressions are usually worn and faded, as well as overpriced for the condition they are in, it also makes the nineteenth century print a fertile and available ground in which perceptive collectors can stake their ground.

Jewels in a Stack of Mass Production

I would not by any means argue that all nineteenth century prints are of equal interest, or equally worthy of collection. In this age of large and frequent print runs, there are countless examples of slap-dash work, on the part of the designers as well as the printers, but buried in those stacks of inexpensive prints are some true masterpieces of artistry and design.

I have selected for examination here a dozen areas that I believe are of particular interest for the collector, in all of which a variety of exceptional works at low prices remain for the collector today.

Collector's Mentality

When we examine the reasons for the neglect of the nineteenth century print in early writings on ukiyo-e, it comes apparent that part of this neglect is due to what I call the "collector's mentality".

In any given collecting field involving the presence of multiples, be it coins, stamps, or prints, the rarest pieces will always fetch the highest values, and the common pieces the lowest, adjusted by the demand for a given item. This is simply the nature of the market, but it does not necessarily reflect the quality or interest of any particular item. The hallowed, rarer item will take on interest simply by sake of its scarcity and desirability, and the readily available item will be largely overlooked, as common.

Of course, there are exceptions to this general rule. There were as many Mickey Mantle as Ed Snodgrass baseball cards printed in 1954, but the values are quite different. In the same way, works by exalted artists like Hokusai and Hiroshige, common as they are, are quite highly valued. But in general, the neglect of the nineteenth century print is due not only to the overproduction that hid its finer pieces in piles of mediocre works, but of the mentality that saw the earlier and rarer works as innately better than the later and plentiful ones.

Changing Opinions

As times change, and the fine condition nineteenth century print now becomes something of a rarity on the general market, the evaluation of this period has begun to change. The acknowledged artistic excellence of Kuniyoshi, and Yoshitoshi in his wake, the rising prices for the "decadent" beauty prints of Eisen and Kunisada, the belated recognition of the high artistic and technical quality of kuchi-e prints, these are but a few of the revisions of the earlier dismissal of the nineteenth century print, and more are surely on the way.

Prints that had formerly been rejected at a glance, as being in the wrong (e.g. late) style, too strongly colored, too violent in subject matter and approach, too crowded and cluttered, and most of all, altogether too common, are now being studied more seriously.

Treasures among Low-Priced Prints

Still, even as the prices for all varieties of prints have sharply risen, there is yet a tendency to categorize prints generally by their period or artist, and to miss the interest of an individual piece, especially with works by minor artists. Where dealers assign value to prints according to the current standards of market value, collectors can use their experience, taste and their own standards of value to decide what is important and valuable to them, finding treasures among the low-priced prints.

Market Niches

What follows are a group of short essays on some areas of nineteenth century prints that I believe to be of high interest and rewarding for the collector. These are no great secrets for the most part, as I am speaking of those prints that are still readily available on the market, at local auctions, on the internet and sometimes even in dealers' low priced piles.

But I do hope that my comments, ever subjective and sometimes even obvious as they are, will help collectors to look at prints differently, to attempt to overcome some of their unexamined resistance to certain genres of the nineteenth century. Not every one of these "niches" in the current market will appeal deeply to everyone, nor should they. But I do believe that all of these possible focuses for collections have much to recommend them, and I, for one, would certainly enjoy seeing any collection that had specialized in any of these areas. Perhaps yours already does....

Dan McKee

The author, Dan McKee is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the Japanese literature program at Cornell University, NY.  He has a Master of the Fine Arts degree from Syracuse University, as well as an M.A. from Cornell.

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