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The Complete Shunga Legacy of
Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849)
Katsushika Hokusai ’s
talent,mania and perseverance for portraying nature in all
its facets was the reason he excelled in all ukiyo-e
genres including the erotic subject of shunga.This
was an important genre of Japanese painting, prints and book
illustration, and to which, at the time, no moral stigma was
attached. His early work (1780s) at first in shunga
illustration
was executed in a style close to his teacher Shunsho
(1726-1792). Unlike his later erotica, these works are often
signed and otherwise would have been difficult to
distinguish from
the work fellow-students in the Shunsho school.
Surimono - Egoyomi (Calendar
print)
After Hokusai’s training at
the Shunsho school, a hiatus of 10 years, we begin to
discover unsigned erotic pieces in the characteristic
Hokusai style, in the miniature-surimono
(commisioned
print) size called egoyomi (calendar print). These
small, private editions for the devotees of the time were
originally published in sets of twelve prints, enclosed
in wrappers
or envelopes – usually now lost – which included the
title of the set, often the date, and sometimes even the
pseudonym of the artist. The printing is extremely subtle,
and in materials
and techniques they are analogous to surimono.
The
specific sequence of the ‘long’ (thirty-day) or ‘short’
(twenty-nine) months of the coming year was indicated in
their composition or through the incorporation of numerals,
sometimes
in rebus form. Around 1800 the device of egoyomi, or
‘pictorial calendar prints’, was adopted by shunga
designers.
Some of these miniature shunga
feature an ingenious flip-up device in which a seperately
printed little flap is pasted to the print, providing both
discreet and indiscreet versions
of
the same design. This flap was, however, often lost – or
removed by unsubtle aficionados (a complete example can be
seen in fig.1 and 2).
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(Fig.2) |
A curious countryman is
peeking through a window of a bathhouse where a couple is
making love, c.1805 (From the
Rene Scholten Collection) |
It will be obvious that this
kind of ‘play-print’ (adult toys, so to speak) is not
susceptible to easy reproduction, and the tactile joy of
flipping must be left to the reader’s imagination.
This device – termed shikake-e
or ‘trick-picture’, and sometimes a feature of later
shunga books as well – is always most ingeniously
contrived (and provides vivid evidence that Japanese dexterity in export
markets should not have been so unexpected).
One cannot claim that these
minuscule calendar prints (sometimes, only one of the set
includes the actual date) are important works of art: merely
that they are of higher quality,
more enjoyable and creative
than most of the greeting cards one sees nowadays. Such
colourful little adult toys cater to people’s latent
voyeurism and delight in games. They are not ostenatiously erotic.
With a set of these playful gems in hand, one is all too
readily transported to another and more leisurely age, when
the erotic was merely one of humanity’s natural pleasures.
It must be commented that the
influence of the woodblock-carver increases in proportion to
the miniaturization of a tableau. In the absence of
signature, with such tiny prints (smaller
than a postcard) absolute
authentication of the artist is not easy. To weed out the
works of pupils (Sori III and Shinsai for the early ones,
Hokusai II, Taito II and Eisen for the later) is not a simple task, even for
the specialist.
Shunga Books
With most of Hokusai’s
shunga books, however – to which we now turn – there is
rather more certainty of authorship. And like most of the
artist’s more impressive erotica these are
clustered together in the
years c.1812-21. The master was now in his mid-fifties:
perhaps his own sexual powers declining; or perhaps simply a
rejuvenation of youthful passion; but, above all, no doubt,
stimulated by the flood of erotic publishing commissions
that characterized this particular age of Edo culture.
Pining for Love
(Kinoe no komatsu)
Hokusai’s first datable
book is Kinoe no komatsu, c.1814. Like all of the
later Hokusai shunga books, it was issued in three slim
volumes with five or so double-page colour plates to
each fascicle. As is
customary, the text takes the form of a novelette recounting
the erotic adventures of various heroes and heroines. The
complicated plots – and Hokusai’s probable involvement in their
composition – must form the subject for a later study (he
was fond, for example, of vividly employed erotic
onomatopoeia); we can here only cite a few characteristic
illustrations. Off course, Pining
for Love is most famous because of the >
Diving
Girl Ravished by Octopuses - design but it includes more
masterful scenes as well like for instance the lesbian
intermezzo (see Fig. 3) with its deliberate composition and
use of colour and also the Chinese Couple (see Fig. 4)
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Fig.3 (Print from our own
gallery)
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Fig.4 (Print from our own gallery)
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It is important to emphasize
that there had been no tradition of nude art in the Far
East. The naked form appeared only incidentally: in scenes
of disaster and pillage, or of bathing, for
example, but with hardly any
erotic connotations; and in shunga, where the
situations were erotic but the nudity was not. (To be sure,
at periods of government ‘reforms’ semi-nude depictions sometimes
flourished briefly in ukiyo-e, in reaction to the
bans) Nor was there any long tradition of sketching from
life – or one of the nude per se. Thus, not having studied
anatomy or the originals in
any systematic manner, the Japanese artist was at a
disadvantage in attempting to depict the human form; and
Hokusai was certainly one of the pioneers in this category, as he was
in many others.
Indeed, this opportunity to
attempt a new genre, a new approach to the human form, may
well have been one of his principal stimuli to such
elaborate erotic productions. There was, in
fact, no particular stigma
– social or legal – attached to erotic art at the time,
nor to the artists who produced it. This was but another
assignment. Yet with Hokusai, each new commission meant a chance to explore new
worlds of graphic meaning, well above and beyond the
requirements of the particular task in hand.
Gods of Intercourse
(Mampuku wagojin)
The other major work among
the Hokusai’s shunga books will be found in the Gods
of Intercourse (Mampuku wagojin), datable to 1821. The
printing is (at least in the early editions) of
the finest quality and the
illustrations, too, are uniformly excellent. Unlike the
previous work, this one features a number of multiple
scenes: double pairs of couples, onlookers, and the
like. The technique had
appeared earlier in classical shunga scrolls, and
Hokusai adapts it to fill each frame to the limit in complex
compositions.
Such a scene is that of
Fig.5, where the young hero pleasures a matron at right, as
another plays with herself at left. Again the combination of
kimono-patters and minuscule calligraphy
will doubtles seem too busy
for the Western viewer: the faul of the medium, not the
artist. From the same volume, a figure (see Fig.6) features
one of the heroines of the novelette, lying exhausted at the roadside
after being violently raped. The tableau is not all that
different from the Diving Girl Ravished by
Octopuses image and conveys a curious sense of quietude
following outrage.
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Fig.5.
‘Lad with Ladies’
from the series The Gods of Intercourse, c.1821
(Print from our own gallery
– sold)
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Fig.6.
‘Post-rape scene’
from the series >The
Gods of Intercourse,
c.1821
(Print from our own gallery)
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Overlapping Skirts (Tsuma
gasane) and The Jewelled Merkin (Tamakazura)
Two lesser known shunga
books of the period by Hokusai are Overlapping Skirts
(see Fig.7) and The Jewelled Merkin (see Fig.8). Both
books are not in the same league as his other
books in authority and style
(and the second suggests Eisen, who sometimes imitated
Hokusai at this period); but given the intervention of the
woodblock carver they cannot, for the
present, be so readily
removed from the Hokusai canon.
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Fig.7 .
From the series Overlapping Skirts,
c.1820
(Print from our own gallery)
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Fig.8.
From the series The Jewelled Wig, c.1820
(Print from our own gallery)
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Oban Series
Hokusai’s remaining – and
more major – shunga oeuvre are in the album format:
sets of twelve prints, usually in the larger, oban
size, plus brief texts. Bound in accordian fashion, the plates are easily dismounted
and many are thus scattered through the worldwide
collections.
Brocade of the East (Azuma
nishiki)
The first oban album
of this period, c.1812, unsigned but in Hokusai’s
distinctive style, is the Brocade of the East (Azuma
nishiki). The album commences with a brief preface
featuring elegant calligraphy,
summarizing the classical themes of sexual love – from the
China of Yang Kuei-fei to the Japan of Prince Narihira –
and of their depiction in ukiyo-e from the shunga albums of Moronobu to the
master of the present work (who is not, however, cited by
name). The preface is signed with the facetious pseudonym
Jokotei (‘Skirt-chaser’), possibly
indentifiable with the minor
novelist Jujitei Sankyu – or, with the young Eisen.
Hokusai here (see Fig.9)
presents a variation on his favored composition, with the
maiden resting her head and arm on a lacquered box at left,
as her young lover commences to mount
her from the rear.
Interestingly enough – alone of the plates in the album
– the scene depicts a famous couple from the contemporary kabuki
stage (and even earlier, from the puppet theater): O-Koma and Saiza.
(A pair also immortalized in a famous Yoshitoshi diptych:
the hairdresser Saiza suddenly struck by O-Kama’s beauty,
as she however, seem to have been made for literary purposes,
but simply to take advantage of the current popularity of
these two characters in contemporary kabuki. Compositionally
the scene is again adroitly unified – though O-Kama’s face does
not much mirror the passionate content of her conversation.
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Fig.9.
‘O-Kama and Saiza’
(Sheet 10) from the series >Brocade
of the East, c.1812.
(Print from our own gallery)
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Models of Loving Couples (Tsui
no hinagata)
The most famous of these
albums is Models of Loving Couples (Tsui no hinagata)
dating from c.1814. Each plate of the album is filled with
the forms of amorous couples; the compositions,
enhanced by bold yet tasteful
colouring, are often striking, with the texts (comprising
the participants’ conversation) rather less obtrusive than
in the smaller books. Each plate of the album is filled with the forms of
amorous couples; the compositions, enhanced by bold yet
tasteful colouring, are often striking, with the texts
(comprising the participants’ conversation) rather less
obtrusive than in the smaller
books.
The word tsui can be
interpreted as ‘couple’ or ‘male and female pairs’.
It is also possible that Hokusai intended a wordplay as the
word tsui (written here tsuhi) can also be
pronounced tsubi,
an archaic term for ‘vulva’.
One of the plates in the work is signed ‘Shishoku Ganko’.This
has been interpreted as a pseudonym for Hokusai, even though
this theory cannot be substantiated.
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Fig.10.
‘Relaxing Couple
with two black mice and cat’ (Sheet 4) from the series
Models of Loving Couples, c.1814.
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Richard Lane remarks on this
design (Fig.10):
...As is customary with
Hokusai, in one scene of the series we are afforded a brief
respite from the acrobatic exertions of sexual passion.
Here, the lovers are seen in mid-summer, taking their
own brief respite from sex:
the drowsing woman, still holding gently but firmly onto her
lover’s spent phallus.
And, in that adroit touch of
humor and variety with which few artists but Hokusai could
succeed, at bottom we view two black mice, engaged in their
own lovemaking, doubtless, stimulated by
what they have just seen of
human efforts in that endeavor? (This possibility is not
just a figment of my imagination: cf. Hokusai’s notable
shunga scene involving the passionate conversation of
> two rutting dogs). Not only that, but a pert little,
bellendand-beribboned kitten looks on curiously at left: too
young either to know much of sex itself,
or even, luckily, to present any real danger to the
love-possessed mice. (Rarely for any shunga print,
the lovers’previous sexual acts and conversation are
recorded in
detail through the kitten’s
eyes – presented in the form of acatish monologue).
“...Note: Readers
interested in animal psychology may well ask if rats might,
indeed, be stimulated by viewing sniffing human sexual
activity. I have been unable to locate any scientific study
concerning this intriguing
subject, which might well constitute an excellent theme for
a Ph.D. dissertation (with, I should think, no shortage of
unpaid volunteers). Eisen’s memorable scene of love-making
> monkey-trainer
and aroused monkey comes immediately to
mind...” [...] (Richard Lane)
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Fig.11.
‘Festive lovers’
(Sheet 2) from the series ‘Models of the Loving Couples’
, c.1814
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In this tightly filled frame
(Fig.11), a geisha and her secret lover meet at festival
time – he is sporting a half-opened fan and cape, regalia
for performance of the Lion Dance. The tension of the
situation is well expressed
by the girl’s passionate kiss (in Japan, reserved for
intimate contact only), and in the strategic placement of
the man’s hand. (The reader unfamiliar with the Orient
may require time to
differentiate the participants’ various appendages, but it
is worth the effort).
As is customary in shunga,
the sex organs are depicted in exaggerated size: an artistic
device that is perhaps a vestige of ancient phallic worship,
perhaps symbolic of the protagonists’ highly
aroused state; and certainly,
an aid to focusing the composition.
Richard Lane on this Hokusai
design: “I would myself certainly consider this the
masterpiece of the album: its composition is impeccable, its
lovers’ powerful emotions at their peak – a fact most
forcefully apparent even to
the casual viewer. The scene represents, in fact, that true
acme of erotic pleasure: when overpowering passions and
expectations fill the entire bodies of the protagonists,
making their subsequent ‘climax’
more an aferthought than a main event.[...] (The Complete
Ukiyo-e Shunga (Vol.13) by Richard Lane).
Plovers Above the Waves (Namichidori)
and The Adonis Plant (Fukujuso)
From the late 1810s, Hokusai’s
shunga style turns even more to massive figures and
monumental compositions, filling – and sometimes reaching
beyond – the frame of the print. His major work
of this later period is
popularity known, from the pattern on its decorated cover,
as Plovers Above the Waves (Namichidori), c.1828.
This significant production exists in several editions, but
the earliest is probably that
issued under the title The Adonis Plant (Fukujuso, a New
Year’s Symbol), c.1822. This album is characterized by
its adult nature: there are hardly any scenes of young,
romantic love, and indeed,
there is a preponderance of matrons – including widows and
unfaithful wives – at dalliance with their husbands or
lovers.
Stylistically, the album is
characterized by massive, stunning figures, which literally
fill each sheet from corner to corner – what space remians
being filled with the participants’ vividly phrased
sexual conversation. In the
better-known and more luxuriant edition of this album –
Plovers Above the Waves – the woodblocks are recarved and
the text is deleted, being replaced by an opulent
background of mica dust;
hand-colouring is added here and there, and the vulva
details are also hand-applied (whether by Hokusai or
assistant is unclear).
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Fig.12.
‘Suckling Lover ’
from the series ‘Plovers Above the Waves’ (Sheet 3),
c.1828, sumizuri-e, hand-colored with mica.
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Here you can find the Meiji
impression of this Hokusai design by the well-known Meiji
artist > Ikeda
Terukata.
Here (see Fig.12) a more
mature couple – husband and pregnant wife – are seen at
passionate foreplay: the woman urging the playful man to get
on with the main act – forthwith directing him in
the details of every desired
variation of penetration. This is another of the most
effective designs in the set displaying a lot of erotic
power. Suckling scenes are rather frequent in Hokusai and
one is reminded immediately of
the charming illustration of matron and young lover in >
Manpuku
wagojin.
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Fig.13
‘Bathhouse Rape’ (Sheet 7)
from the series >The
Adonis Plant, c.1822.
(Print from our own gallery)
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This Hokusai image (Fig.13)
features a rather deviating and comical design from the The
Adonis Plant (c.1822) with a moronic bath-house
attendant trying to seduce a pretty maiden, he had
observed for a long time,
while she has emerged from the bath. In most cases the
sympathy of the viewer lies with the victim (off course) as
usually displayed in shunga scenes but in this case
one tends to feel pity for
the clumsy, yearning assistant – who has a coin in his
ear, which was the custom at that time of purse-less
servants.
> Here
you can find an example of a retard whose lovelorning has
been rewarded.
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Fig.1 4
‘Mother and Child’
(1st sheet) from the series The Adonis Plant, c.1820.
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Richard Lane: “ (Fig.14)
What a strange way to commence a shunga album! –
this is real Hokusai ! A reclining voluptuous and
mature female holds her plump.aggresive little boy in her
arms; her skirt in disarray and her
private parts on full display. Many are the connoisseurs who
have enjoyed tis famous print for its unusual theme and
masterful, wave-patterned kimono (the shadowy plover-pattern perhaps the
inspiration for the later, ‘Nami-chidori’ nickname for
the album); but I suspect there are few who have bothered to
read the text: the mother – á la Molly Bloom of James
Joyce’s Ulysses –
reminisces on the sexual pleasures of the night before:
first reacting a full list of the ten most common types of
phallus and finally concluding her own husband’s is the
best of all: the result, the
doubtless, of her prayers to Buddha.
Whether this monologue is
spoken aloud or not, we do not know. But we are suddenly
awakened from our reverie as the child pipes up: “When I
get big, I’m going to be a great lover too: teach
me how to do it like Mommy
and Daddy did last night!...” [...] (The Complete Ukiyo-e
Shunga (Vol.23) by Richard Lane).
The Horny God of Izumo (En
musubi Izumo no sugi)
The first edition of the The
Horny God album is so rare that up to now only Hokusai
expert Dr. Richard Lane has seen the set in his totality.
The prints are in the smaller chuban size and dates
from 1822. Again, it’s
visuals are characteristic of Hokusai’s final stage of shunga
production. The protagonists are depicted in increasingly
massive fashion, as though sculpted from blocks of wood or marble, and here
Hokusai foreshadows one of the trends of modern sculpture,
while admittedly considerably reducing the passionate
content of his shunga.
One may well reinquire here
as to what drove Hokusai to such increasing extremes in the
depiction of sex at this period? Obviously, the commissions
were there: ukiyo-e artists did not paint just for fun, nor publish for
their own amusement. But there is more to this remarkable
interval of erotic activity than a simple job to be done.
One thinks here, inevitably, of Picasso (who was, incidentally, an avid
collector of Japanese shunga), and of his similar
burst of erotic energy in his later years; and, without
wishing to go any further into psychoanalysis than I have
already, I think it will be clear that,
at least, one of the keys to Hokusai’s personality is to
be found in his shunga of this surprising decade. Scholars
who shy from this difficult theme will do so only at the risk of missing half
their man.
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Fig.15.
Meiji impression of
Hokusai’s The Horny God of Izumo (Sheet 12), c.1890.
The
blue frame featuring birds
and flowers was not part of
the first edition published in c.1822.
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This striking tableau
(Fig.15), the last of the set, features a vigorous,
attractive widow who calmly determinates the residual sexual
powers of her three admirers. All are shown with their penis
supporting two heavy strings
of Chinese coins. This device was not only to attest to the
men’s capability in sex, but also to their condition as
gigolos. Their complaints are layed bare in the
text: “I’ve never seen
such an insatiable woman. Seven times, and she still wants
more; I’ve had enough...I feel dizzy”. To which this
redoubtable lady dryly comments, “You fellows are too
young to give up so
easily...after I finish a smoke, I’ll give each of you tow
more tries to prove your manhood”. And withal – as
though to emphasize this resolute woman’s powers of
determination – her long smoking-pipe
insistently pokes its red-hot bowl towards the array of
reluctant, albeit well-rewarded, phalli. This is not,
indeed, the usual image of the Yamato-nadeshiko, or demure
Japanese female: an image
which should, obviously, be tempered by that common saying
of a generation or two ago: “Since the end of the War they’ve
become much stronger: ladies’ stockings – and Japanese
womanhood” (Richard Lane).
Decline in Taste
It must also be remembered
that times were changing, and by the middle 1820s all of ukiyo-e
figure-print design was entering its ‘Decadent Period’;
and the new, more plebeian shunga audience
tended to call for more
violence, more impact – even with the same kind of subject
matter. This decline in taste could hardly have escaped
Hokusai’s notice – and that of many other connoisseurs
of the time.The great age of
the figure print, and of shunga, was clearly over;
yet only a few years remained before Hokusai was to revive
the fortunes of ukiyo-e with a revolution in the
landscape print.
Four additional series
attributed to Hokusai
The following shunga series,
including the famous scene featuring the >lesbian
abalone divers with a sea-cucumber, is
designed by Hokusai, but is untitled.
Also
the following series with the dreamlike images has the >
characteristic
features of Hokusai.
There
is also debate on the series Erotic Book of Conjugal
Eddies (Ehon futamigata) whether the designs are by
Hokusai.
The famous four-panel scene with the violent and
sadistic bandit can be found
on the > following
page (last image!).
Check out our >
shunga
section or our section >
completely
dedicated to Hokusai.
References and Sources:
>
Japanese
Erotic Fantasies – Sexual Imagery of the Edo Period
by C. Uhlenbeck and M.
Winkel.
>
The
Complete Ukiyo-e Shunga (Vol.1, 7, 13 and 23)
by
Richard Lane & Y. Hayashi.
>
Shunga,
the Art of Love in Japan
by
Tom and Mary Evans.
>
Hokusai
by
Gian Carlo Calza.
>
Phaidon
Press.
>
Scholten
Japanese Art.
>
Check
out more articles on Hokusai and Japanese wooblock
prints...etc.
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