Ukiyo-e were pictures of exciting people and scenes from the entertainment districts of old [...] Click here to continue reading.]]> Hanga, or Japanese Woodblock Prints

In Japanese, woodblock prints are called hanga; han means ‘a printing block’, and ga is ‘picture’. The colorful and varied tradition of Japanese woodblock printmaking includes 17th to 19th century ‘ukiyo-e’ (the celebrated “Pictures of the Floating World”), 20th century ‘Shin hanga’ (“New Prints”) and ‘Sa ‘ saku hanga’ (“Creative Prints”) works, and Modern/Contemporary prints.

Ukiyo-e were pictures of exciting people and scenes from the entertainment districts of old Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka — the bars, bawdy houses, and theaters that comprised the ‘Water World’. In many cases this was a world of its own, as the entertainment quarters (if not the theaters) were often walled in, and those who made their living from such entertainments were not allowed to go out into the general populace. Samurai, gentlemen, and lesser citizens who could afford it, were allowed inside for the evening — or night.

Popular depictions of the ‘Water World’ are preserved mainly in woodblock prints, as this was the medium by which the pictures could be reproduced and sold to thousands of consumers at prices ordinary people could afford. It was one of the first forms of mass marketing and merchandising of famous people, but woodblock prints (hanga) had already been used — since the 17th century — to distribute many other kinds of art (besides ukiyo-e), particularly landscapes of the Japanese countryside, often accompanying travel guide books.

The technique for making woodblock prints is involved. The artist (whose name goes on the prints) creates at least one copy of the art work. Then the engravers carve the printing boards — one for each color to be used — destroying the original art in the process. Then the printers hand print copy after copy, daubing each board with its particular color in just the right places, then aligning the page so the different colors all fit together.

At one time it was thought by collectors that most hanga were printed in editions of about 200 copies each for their first commercial release. This estimate was based on an estimate of what one skilled printer could accomplish with a standard hanga in a week. Later research has suggested that some popular images or entire series were printed in very large numbers, possibly as many as 5,000 to 10,000 impressions. Inspection of surviving prints demonstrate many with sharp, unbroken keyblock lines and exactly registered colors printed with great care and subtlety; other later impressions of the same image have worn out keyblock lines, poorly registered colors, and crudely printed patterns, indicating many pulls from the original blocks (in some cases by several different publishers as the blocks were sold or transferred to alternate printing studios). Whether standard hanga editions were typically printed in thousands of impressions remains uncertain, although the economics of printmaking and the ability of master printers to coax out many hundreds or even thousands of good impressions support that possibility.

On a more limited scale, certain privately distributed prints for special occasions (called surimono) generally seemed to have been issued in editions of 200 sheets or less. Whatever the number issued, these editions faced a terrible attrition rate, not only from normal handling, but from Tokyo’s many conflagrations, the terrible Kanta´ earthquake and resulting fires of 1923 and the Second World War as well. Their individual prints, in many instances, survive today in shockingly small numbers, especially early hanga of the 17th and 18th centuries.

Further Recommended Reading

How to Identify Prints by Bamber Gascoigne