When I first learned of paintings by Hokusai’s daughter, I was intrigued by her purely on that basis alone. Prominent women artists are rare in pre-20th century Japanese art, and while plenty of ukiyo-e artists were directly related to their masters or predecessors, somehow a daughter, particularly a daughter of such a great master as Hokusai, who did not found a school nor have all that many direct disciples, has a particular allure.
We have all heard of Hokusai – or are at least familiar with some of his most famous works even if we don’t know it. They are practically everpresent, used extensively in advertising, in cheap Japan-themed calendars and the like. But who knew he had a daughter of any note – that is to say, a daughter who was a prominent and accomplished artist in her own right?
I was introduced to Ôi through the painting at left, from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, dubbed by the MFA curators simply “Three Women Playing Musical Instruments.” A fairly straightforward work, at least upon first glance, I would never have given it a second thought if it were not by someone as intriguing as Katsushika Ôi. Granted, it is a beautiful piece, expertly painted, with bold, beautiful colors. Granted, to see a figure with their back to us isn’t overly common, and it creates a sense of space between the three figures who are otherwise relatively flat; hardly an innovative move, but certainly interesting in its own way. Plus, the woman on the left is playing a kokyû, an instrument hardly ever heard of, let alone seen or heard today, even in geisha quarters or traditional/classical performance troupes, despite it being so essential to the trio ensemble seen here, the sankyoku of kokyû, shamisen, koto. Still, for all of that, the composition hardly stands out against other ukiyo-e works. The style resembles that of her father, Hokusai, very closely, and does not stand out to me, grabbing my eye and commanding my attention the way certain Hokusai works, or many works by Kaigetsudô artists, Miyagawa Chôshun, or others do.
Intrigued by Ôi therefore purely as a historical figure, as a female artist, and for her ties to the great master, but not so much for her artworks themselves, I sought out more about her, and was kindly informed by my good friend Kathryn about an article on Ôi by the prominent ukiyo-e scholar Kobayashi Tadashi*.
“Three Women Playing Musical Instruments” may not have made much of an impression upon me, but “Night Scene in the Yoshiwara,” seen at the top of this post, struck me, immediately, in a way few paintings do.
It took me a few moments to realize what it was that was so tantalizing and striking about this image. Granted, it’s a beautiful scene, with bright colors, but so are just about all ukiyo-e paintings. Then it hit me. Of course! Traditional Japanese paintings don’t show the interplay of light and shadow, and this painting does that in a major way.
Ôi shows herself here to be not simply playing with light and shadow as a curiosity, as many ukiyo-e artists toyed with Western-style one-point perspective for a time. Rather, she employs it quite expertly, to the fullest effect, creating a scene which speaks its mood and atmosphere clearly and directly (to a modern-day Western viewer such as myself, at least). Typically, in traditional Japanese painting, we would expect to see night scenes lit up as bright as day, no light sources evident, no shadows depicted. Only the moon in the sky, torches, lanterns, candles, and other signs would indicate it to be a night scene, nothing in the mood or shading of the image overall.
Over a half century earlier, Harunobu was perhaps the first Japanese artist to depict a night scene with a solid black (or very dark color) background, rather than a blank white or other solid color background used indeterminately for any time of day or night. Yosa Buson experimented with this too, in one of my favorite compositions, but it never took hold in the Japanese painting or prints traditions, and remained revolutionary and unusual when Ôi did it many decades later.
Her technical skill and eye for detail in this image are astounding. The soft focus effect seen in the way the various light sources pierce the darkness, each pool of light fading softly – not too sharply – into the darkness at its edges, creates an effect unlike any I have ever seen in ukiyo-e. It is not simply her technical skill which impresses, though, of course, but the effect created, the mood set, the picture painted, which strikes me so.
In a way, the lanterns and other light sources resonate with, or parallel, the music being performed by the courtesans within, and with the presence of the beautiful women themselves. The women, and their music, like the lanterns, cut through the dark night, beacons of light, song, entertainment and pleasure in the otherwise depressing, isolating, and perhaps frightening darkness.
In most ukiyo-e, I find it difficult to imagine the music and liveliness of the pleasure quarters. The colors in many paintings can be quite bold, but the universal light source and absence of shadows seen in most works washes out the image in a way, I feel. The light itself takes away from the courtesans’ role in providing that source of happiness, of entertainment, of metaphorical light in the darkness. Here, by enveloping the courtesans and their world in darkness, as it would be in reality, the pleasure districts being a place of evening pleasures after all, Ôi has conversely allowed them to shine, and their music to be heard.
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*Kobayashi, Tadashi. Julie Nelson Davis (trans.). “The Floating World in Light and Shadow: Ukiyo-e Paintings by Hokusai’s Daughter Ôi.” in Carpenter, John et al (eds). Hokusai and his Age. Hotei Publishing, 2005. pp93-103.
The article you cite is actually by Kobayashi Tadashi.
Geez. Wow. What an embarrassing error, given I had the article right in front of me. Thanks for pointing that out.
Tsuji and Kobayashi seem to appear so often in the same publications, I tend to think of them together, which leads to getting them mixed up.
Oh, wow. That first painting is really amazing. You’re completely right about the interplay of light and dark–I don’t think I’ve seen a Japanese painting in that style with that style of lighting. (Normally, the scene would just be all light, I think.) It really increases the separation of the customers from the geisha quarters and the dramatic tension, for lack of a better term, of the piece.
(I suck at describing works of art, so my apologies.)
I don’t think you suck at it at all. You’d be surprised at how simple and basic a lot of art historical writing can be. Yeah, sometimes some scholars use a lot of jargon, but a lot of it really sounds just like what you’re saying with the lighting increasing “the separation of the customers from the geisha, and the dramatic tension.”
Not to put too fine a point on it, but I do believe that they are courtesans, i.e. prostitutes, though, not geisha. Geisha dress much more modestly, in a less flashy manner. While courtesans do many of the things geisha do – singing, dancing, playing instruments, pouring drinks, entertaining their customers through conversation – ultimately, some would argue (and some, incl. Dalby and Seigle might disagree) that the world of the courtesan was ultimately all about sex. That of the geisha was not; a crucial difference.
Thanks much for reading, and for your comments and thoughts as always!!
Ah, my bad. Though I’ve read Dalby and am aware the distinctions between courtesans, prostitutes, and geisha, I’m not terribly familiar with the evolution of their hairstyles and fashions. (Sans bringing eyebrows and non-blackened teeth back.)
I also seem to have skipped the last two paragraphs because I am a lamer–that would have ensured the usage of the correct term. -_-;;
Ah, well, if you’ve read Dalby, then you’ve got one over on me.
Most of the intricate differences are totally lost on me – I couldn’t distinguish a tayû from an oiran, or an apprentice maiko from a full geiko, a Genroku courtesan from a later 19th century one…
そのことを指摘して、すみませんね。
いいえ、いええ。私の研究に関係がほとんどなかったから、ダルビーの本を読んだこと知れるわけがないよ。でも、本当にすばらしい本ですよ。読むのは楽しかったから、本当に「それは私の博士卒論」という感じがなっかた。勧めです!
Hello-
I have been researching Oi for 5 years. My novel The Ghost Brush, about Oi, and her lost works, and the way she almost but not quite vanished from history, will be published in May 2010 by HarperCollins in Canada, and in September in the US> I am excited to see your post because you can troll the internet at length and never see a word about this great painter.
So thank you.
If you like I can put you on my list so you’ll get news of the book.
Sure, why not?
Thanks for reading and for commenting. It’s always exciting when my humble blog attracts the eye of new, outside people (though I love you too, loyal regular readers!).
Have a look at the website. The Ghost Brush is published in Canada- available in p-book and soon-maybe next week- in e-book. I hope you get a chance to read it. Katsushika Oi brought back to life.
follow me on twitter kmgovier to see the great reviews of the novel about Oei
ukiyo-e are wood prints and not paintings.
Ah. Yes. This is one of the common misconceptions. Since the woodblock prints are so ubiquitous, people come to associate woodblock prints with ukiyo-e. And with good reason.
But, ukiyo-e was a style, and there are ukiyo-e paintings as well as prints. In fact, every single one of the print artists – from Kiyonaga to Hiroshige, from Harunobu to Kunisada, from Hokusai to Utamaro – produced only paintings, i.e. designs, which the publisher then took and had made into prints. Artists such as Hokusai and Harunobu never carved woodblocks themselves, nor did the work of imprinting images from the woodblocks onto the paper – rather, they painted the designs. So, really, everyone that we know of as “print artists,” were in fact painters.
Drama & Desire was an exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, a few years ago, of only ukiyo-e paintings (not prints), and the catalog is hopefully a good source, if you’re interested, for reading about this phenomenon of ukiyo-e paintings (also known as “nikuhitsuga”).
[…] “Cherry Blossom in the Night” by Katsushika Oi (1800-1866), a Japanese woman ukiyo-e painter, daughter of the famous Katsushika Hokusai. There are only a few female artists known in Japan, who mastered in the woodblock painting of that time. Light and shadow is extremely skillfully painted in this picture. Its beauty is outstanding. If you are interested in biographical background information you will find it at the SamuraiWiki or go to this interesting post about Katsushika Oi. […]
[…] established herself as an artist outside her father’s influence. But later in her life she divorced her husband and went to assist […]
Thanks for the link!!
[…] spoon-tamago.com / chaari.wordpress.com / […]
The works of Oi Hokusai, and the 3D shaded paintings attributed to her father in his old age, but most likely painted by Oi and signed with her father’s seal, bear a striking resemblance to the paintings done by Nagasaki based Japanese artists who had been trained or influenced by Philipp Franz von Siebold, the German naturalist who lived with the Dutch traders.