Lauren Dew
Toshi Yoshida and Kacho-e
Japanese woodblock print artist Toshi Yoshida is well known for his varied stylistic techniques. From experimentation with modern abstract art to emulations of classic Japanese landscapes, Toshi Yoshida executed all of his works with style and grace. Raicho, his first woodblock print, surpassed his father’s rendering of the same subject in many critics’ eyes. Yoshida excelled at depicting many different styles and subjects, but his first and favorite subject was animals. While Yoshida had an incredibly diverse portfolio when it came to portraying animals, including a complex series of African wildlife, he printed birds and flowers throughout his lifetime. Yoshida wasn’t the first woodblock print artist to have an interest in portraying birds, and followed in the impressive footsteps of many woodblock print artists who came before him, adding his own unique perspective to the classic style of kacho-e.
Kacho-e is the formal word for classic Japanese bird and flower printing, which is a fairly prevalent theme in ukiyo-e. Despite the name ‘bird and flower’ print, having both birds and flowers seems to be optional, and many people use the term kacho-e for works that just have birds interacting with their natural habitat. However, prints of birds were not considered high art in Japan, and weren’t nearly as sought-after as actor and landscape prints by Japanese collectors. Conversely, western collectors found the bird and flower prints fascinating and highly collectible. Ukiyo-e garnered the attention of the Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, and the 20th Century Art Nouveau movement, and examples of kacho-e could be found in the collections of Monet and Van Gogh. While kacho-e is often dismissed as a lesser subject in comparison with its more popular contemporaries, the world of flower and bird painting is diverse and unquestionably beautiful, and doesn’t deserve the reputation of an abnormal rarity.
Katsushika Hokusai was one of the first artists to transfer the bird and flower motif from drawings to woodblock prints. Works such as Peonies and Canary and Flock of Chickens provide an excellent example of Hokusai’s flowing technique. While Hokusai is well known for his ability to create magnificent landscape prints that seem to exude movement, few scholars comment on how his ability to portray action transfers to the kacho-e motif. The feathers in Flock of Chickens seem to swirl with movement, much like his better known works featuring water, and the facial expressions of the birds are almost human in their obvious portrayals of bewilderment and contentment. Among Hokusai’s kacho-e prints are several extremely rare small upright prints, which happen to be considered some of his best work. He also produced several well known illustrations for a book written by Katsushika Taito which were done under a pseudonym.
Following Hokusai was a young man named Ando Hiroshige, who managed to become quite popular in the world of ukiyo-e, and his success with kacho-e was unprecedented. It has been estimated that Hiroshige managed to create over 5000 studies of birds and flowers during his forty year career. Hiroshige was greatly inspired by the Chinese tradition of bird and flower printing, and many of his works were done in a style that is obviously Chinese in origin. Part of the reason that Hiroshige was so prosperous with his kacho-e is because he was able to appeal to the part of Japan that craved elegant symbolic art done in a traditional style. His works featured several different birds, such as sparrows, roosters, geese, and parrots. Hiroshige published his kacho-e prints in several different series. While the best known series with Hiroshige’s kacho-e is Kwacho (“Birds and Flowers”), it also appears in his prominent series “One Hundred Famous Views of Edo” in the work An Eagle Flying over the Hundred-Thousand Tsubo Plain at Susaki near Fukagawa. This work features a magnificent view of a Hodgson’s hawk-eagle circling snow covered plains in the dark night sky. The body of the bird is twisted in movement, as though ready to strike whatever prey it stalks below. Hiroshige’s depiction of the eagle is an excellent example of his new contributions to kacho-e. Hokusai may have brought the art of kacho-e into the mainstream, but he strived to show the perfection in the birds and their surroundings. Hiroshige, on the other hand, had no problem with portraying the grittier pieces of reality in his works, from dying flowers to hunting birds. As H. G. Henderson comments in The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, “While Hokusai made a dream world, often of entrancing beauty, Hiroshige loved to set down the realities of nature, even its defects and oddities. As Japanese say even to the present day, it is astonishing how perfectly nature can copy the works of Hiroshige.”
Toshi Yoshida followed in the footsteps of those famous woodblock printers who came before him and began a diverse portfolio of ukiyo-e, including several examples of kacho-e. Yoshida infused the style of kacho-e with a new sense of realism and depth. While Hiroshige and Hokusai’s kacho-e prints are beautiful, they often seem two-dimensional and fall slightly short of seeming natural. Yoshida is able to take traditional subject matter and impart a new sense of style. Yoshida is known for his willingness to experiment with a multitude of artistic styles and techniques, yet his love of kacho-e followed him throughout his life. Raicho was the first woodblock print Toshi Yoshida did by himself at the age of 19, capturing the subtle yet complex variation in colors of the grouse and her chicks as well as the intricate feathering. When first displayed, critics commented that the young Yoshida managed to surpass his father in portraying realistic animals. In 1975 he printed Cormorant Island, featuring a gaggle of cormorants on a craggy rock face. In the late 1970’s and early 80’s, Yoshida created two fantastic views of birds of prey soaring through the skies. The first, called Flying, portrayed a black owl with bright blue eyes flying through the twilight sky. A few years later he printed Flying Up, which featured a sinister looking hawk over a texturized background. Nearly sixty years after Raicho was conceived he created the Double Cherry and Maple prints, portraying small birds perched on a tree in the spring and autumn respectively. The print Dance of Eternal Love features two cranes, classic auspicious symbols of longevity, fluttering around each other in a snowstorm. This would be one of the last prints the ailing Toshi Yoshida would create before his death in 1995. It seems appropriate that kacho-e highlighted the beginning and the ending of Yoshida’s illustrious career as an artist.
Toshi Yoshida had an enormous impact on the world of woodblock printing as a whole, and his new and varied styles brought him well-deserved fame. His abstract work was a true contribution to woodblock printing. However, it would be a crime to overlook Yoshida’s contribution to the world of classical bird and flower printing. Following in the footsteps of such great artists as Hokusai and Hiroshige, Toshi Yoshida managed to take the common kacho-e motif and infuse it with new life and realism.
Bibliography:
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