Japanese Prints

An illustrated introduction to Japanese woodblock prints which takes a fresh approach to the most familiar and widely appreciated traditional Japanese art form.
Japanese woodblock prints in the Edo period (1615- 1868) were the products of a highly commercialised and competitive publishing industry. Scores of publishers competed for the services of the leading artists of the day.
In recent years, publications by scholars in Japan, Europe and the United States have made possible a more subtle appreciation of the imagery encountered in these works of art.
Drawing upon this recent scholarship, this book explains how these prints would have been interpreted when they were first made.