In the following interview, director Marianne Doezema discusses the special exhibition Fifty-three Views of the Floating World: Japanese Woodblock Prints, with guest curator, Michael Marlais. MD: First I want to thank you for serving as guest curator for this exhibition, which features a selection of prints from the museum's collection. Tell me about the show's title. MM: The title is meant to evoke in a specific way the great print series of the 19th century such as Hokusai's Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji, Hiroshige's Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido Road or and the Sixty-nine Stations of the Kisokaido; but also in a general way it is meant to evoke the way ukiyo-e prints have typically been organized into series of numbered editions. MD: I understand that ukiyo-e means "pictures of the floating world." What is the "floating world"? MM: Traditionally, it meant anything fleeting or the things of this earth, but specifically, it came to refer to the entertainments of the chonin, the townspeople of the capital city of Edo. These entertainments included the nightlife of the Yoshiwara district, which revolved around the courtesans who lived there, and the Kabuki theatre, essentially a popular response to the more sophisticated No drama of the elite classes. MD: Was the beginning of the ukiyo-e print tradition concurrent with the earliest manifestations of these cultural developments? MM: Yes, the Tokugawa period, which began in the early 17th century, was controlled by a strong military and enjoyed relative peace and prosperity. During this prosperous era, a middle-class population developed that became a cultural force. The subjects of ukiyo-e, by contrast to the more traditional art forms, appealed to this middle class. MD: The exhibition is arranged in three chronological sections. I understand that you were particularly impressed by the museum's holdings in the early period of ukiyo-e. MM: Indeed, the Mount Holyoke collection includes very good prints from the first phase, some dating to the mid-17th century and thus representing the earliest stage of ukiyo-e production. During this so-called "primitive" phase, prints were done in black and white or with a limited range of color, or sometimes the prints were colored by hand. The prints, however, are hardly primitive, with their sophisticated linear designs and graceful rhythms. MD: One of the works you've selected for this exhibition and pictured in the newsletter is a book illustration by Utamaro that is brilliantly colored with a range of dramatic hues. This represents not the first but the second phase of ukiyo-e, correct? MM: Right. The museum has excellent examples from what is termed the classic phase, the period beginning in 1765, when multiple color blocks were used. The best works of the classic phase, by Harunobu and Utamaro, are elegant and refined and at the same time spectacular demonstrations of the printer's art. Illustrations such as the Utamaro you mentioned are sought after today because they retain much of their original color, having been bound in a book and thus shielded from light. MD: What were these books about? MM: The text of most of these books focused on the same themes as the print series, such as types of feminine beauty. But your collection also includes images from a fascinating book by Eishi, The Thirty-six Immortal Women Poets, which features imaginary portraits of the poets, each accompanied by one of their poems, written in calligraphy by young female students in a school of calligraphy that used the book as advertisement for the school. MD: Could it be said that the ukiyo-e tradition developed, flowered, and waned in three periods, with the third period characterized as a baroque or decadent phase? MM: Some scholars have called the 19th century a decadent phase, but that tendency is less prevalent today. I don't believe anyone would consider the great landscapes prints of Hiroshige or Hokusai decadent, for example. But it is true at the same time that ukiyo-e had played itself out by the end of the 19th century. The artists' creative energies seem to have either dissipated or were redirected toward reworking and reinterpreting themes articulated during previous periods. Also, during the later 19th century, some prints were produced to accommodate popular demand and were "knocked out" by the thousands, in printing editions that were not of the highest quality technically. But that being said, some fabulous prints were made in the 19th century. Prints in this exhibition by Kuniyoshi and Kunisada are among the most spectacular examples of ukiyo-e. I would also point to one of the most familiar of Japanese woodblock prints, from Hokusai's book One Hundred Views of Mt. Fuji. It is meant to evoke one of the most famous of the Thirty-six Views of Mt. Fuji, The Great Wave off Kanagawa. But Hokusai has added a flourish here: the top of the wave magically turns into a flock of birds, and Escher-like tour de force of artistic invention and technical display.
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