Hardcover volume, 29.6 x 25 x 4 cm, in red cloth with black lettering to spine, in pictorial dust jacket, profusely illustrated in colour; pp.: [1-6] 7-536, total 268 leaves and 2 folding plates extraneous to collation.

Title-page: {Hotei’s device} Hotei Publishing | Shunga | sex and pleasure in Japanese art | Edited by | Timothy Clark | C. Andrew Gerstle | Aki Ishigami | Akiki Yano ||

Contents: The Cultural Historical Significance and Importance of Japanese Shunga / Kobayashi Tadashi. Introduction: What Was Shunga? / C. Andrew Gerstle; Who Were the Audiences for Shunga? / Hayakawa Monta. (1) Early Shunga before 1765: Shunga Paintings before the `Floating World’ / Akiko Yano; Chinese Chunhua and Japanese Shunga / Ishigami Aki; Shunga and the Rise of Print Culture / Asano Shugo. (2) Masterpieces of Shunga 1765-1850: The Essence of Ukiyo-e Shunga / Kobayashi Tadashi; Erotic Books as Luxury Goods / Ellis Tinios; Listening to the Voices in Shunga / Hayakawa Monta; The Tale of Genji in Shunga / Sato Satoru. (3) Censorship: Timeline of Censorship; Shunga and Censorship in the Edo Period (1600-1868) / Jennifer Preston; Graph of approximate output of shunga print series and books; The Censorship of Shunga in the Modern Era / Ishigami Aki; Shunga Studies in the Showa Era (1926-89) / Shirakura Yoshihiko. (4) Contexts for Shunga: Traditional Uses of Shunga / Yamamoto Yukari; The Distribution and Circulation of Erotic Prints and Books in the Edo Period Laura Moretti; Shunga and Parody / C. Andrew Gerstle; Popular Cults of Sex Organs in Japan / Suzuki Kenko; Grotesque Shunga / Ishigami Aki; Violence in Shunga / Higuchi Kazutaka; Foreign Connections in Shunga / Timon Screech; Children in Shunga / Akiko Yano; Shunga and the Floating World / Matsuba Ryoko. (5) Shunga in the Meiji Era: Erotic Art of the Meiji Era (1868-1912) / Rosina Buckland; The Modern West’s Discovery of Shunga / Ricard Bru.

Published to accompany the exhibition Shunga: sex and pleasure in Japanese art at the British Museum from 3 October 2013 to 5 January 2014.

Abstract: This catalogue aims to answer some key questions about what is shunga and why it was produced. In particular, the social and cultural contexts for sex art in Japan are explored. Erotic Japanese art was heavily suppressed in Japan from the 1870s onwards as part of a process of cultural ‘modernisation’ that imported many contemporary western moral values. Only in the last twenty years or so has it been possible to publish unexpurgated examples in Japan and this landmark book places erotic Japanese art in its historical and cultural context for the first time. This book looks at painted and printed erotic images produced in Japan during the Edo period (1600-1868) and early Meiji era (1868-1912). These are related to the wider contexts of literature, theatre, the culture of the pleasure quarters, and urban consumerism; and interpreted in terms of their sensuality, reverence, humour and parody.

Contributors:

Timothy Clark (British, b. 1959)

Timothy Clark (British, b. 1959)

C. Andrew Gerstle (American, 1951)

Aki Ishigami [石上阿希] (Japanese)

Akiki Yano