Foreign Faces in Japanese Prints March 31, 2007

The Japanese of the Edo period (1600-1868) found foreigners fascinating, and woodblock print (ukiyo-e) artists and publishers were only too happy to accommodate the public's eager interest. From 17th-century ukiyo-e master Hishikawa Moronobu to Okumura Masanobu and Kitagawa Utamaro in the 18th century to Katsushika Hokusai in the early 19th century, print artists found foreign faces irresistible subject. They could be comic yet somehow dangerous, both exotic and erotic. In the Edo period, artists produced scenes of Chinese and Koreans, Portuguese and Hollanders, in the port of Nagasaki, on the streets of Kyoto and Edo, and on the highways in between.