Posted by John Fiorillo on January 09, 1999 at 14:57:28:
In Reply to: Re: Senchô title translation posted by Theo de Kreijger on January 09, 1999 at 10:48:32:
Theo,
I believe the main impetus for the types of series you have identified ("Mitate sanjûrokkasen no uchi", "Chûshingura", "Edo meisho zue", "Tôkaidô gojûsan tsugi no uchi") were the lingering effects of the Tenpô Reforms (1842-47) instituted by Mizuno Tadakuni (1774-1851), the chief councilor to the shogun Tokugawa Ieyoshi. In the first month of 1842 edicts were issued in Edo (similar edicts were put into effect in the seventh month in Osaka) restricting public access to theaters, limiting the prices on and sizes of prints (nothing larger than a triptych), banning stories on "human feelings (called ninjôban), and – most important to this discussion – prints or books illustrating actors or prostitutes. The edicts were enforced quite repressively at first and had a chilling effect on the publishing industry. As a result publishers and artists turned to historical subjects and landscapes. Although Tadakuni fell from power in 1843, the effects of his reforms lasted for some years and publishers returned only gradually to issuing prints that explicitly identified actors (that is why so many prints from the early 1840s-early 1850s do not bear the names of the actors). For example, in "Mitate sanjûrokkasen no uchi" the historical or legendary role played by the actor is given in a small cartouche, ostensibly to indicate the true-life figure represented, though it was a transparent ruse and no Edokko would have been fooled into thinking it was not an actor (plus the physiognomy would identify the actor as well). Kunisada had earlier in the mid-1820s designed finely printed sets in the small koban format of beauties placed before landscapes, and again in the late 1830s when he drew beauties before scenes derived from Hiroshige’s "Tôkaidô gojûsan tsugi no uchi" but in the chûban format. So it was a logical step to try his hand at drawing actors (unnamed) before landscape backgrounds, as in the ôban series you’ve mentioned. The censors could also look the other way by judging these designs as landscapes with figures in the foreground and thus not penalize the publishers for issuing actor prints.
You are right to wonder at the sudden appearance of some many sets of this type. It seems that the Tôkaidô set was enormously popular, widely advertised and celebrated in a song that claimed Kunisada’s pictures were the "flowers of Edo." This being the case, the other series quickly followed. Sebastian Izzard, in his monograph on the artist (Kunisada’s World, 1993), identifies nearly 300 half-length portraits of actors with landscape backgrounds published in the single year of 1852!!!
I would add that with the enormous popularity of the landscape series of Hokusai and Hiroshige from the 1830s firmly established the landscape as a fully realized print genre (that is, beyond the intermittent landscapes appearing since the late 1700s), and it would seem likely that variations on the landscape theme should appeal to the print buying Edo public. Thus combining portraits of actors by the premier designer of actor prints of the mid-nineteenth century with his well-drawn landscape backgrounds would seem to be an almost guaranteed formula for success. That these prints were so amazingly popular is perhaps surprising, but such phenomena occur in all cultures when the timing is just right.
John