Title-page (double-page): The Art of the Japanese Book | VOLUME ONE (TWO) | Sotheby’s Publications ||

Author/Editor:  Jack Ronald Hillier (British, 1912-1995)

Place of Publication: London, United Kingdom

Publisher: Sotheby’s Publications

Date: 1987

Language: English

Description: 2 vols.; hardcover, each 335 × 245 × 63 mm, uniformly bound in cloth with lettering to spine, pictorial endpapers; in pictorial dust jackets, housed in a grey cloth slipcase; designed by Langley Iddins; printed in Great Britain by Jolly & Barber Ltd, Rugby, Warwickshire; bound by Dorset Press, Harlow.

Pagination: Vol. 1: [1–5] 6–606 [2, last blank]; Vol. 2: [609–613] 614–1131 [1 blank].

Includes: 397 plates, of which 225 in colour.

ISBN: 0 85667 317 X

Note:
This monumental two-volume study by Jack Hillier remains the most comprehensive English-language reference on the history, production, and artistry of the Japanese illustrated book. It surveys the evolution of the ehon from its classical roots through the Edo and Meiji periods, up to modern woodblock revival movements. Richly illustrated, it combines detailed biographical entries, critical essays, and full bibliographical references.

Contents

VOLUME ONE

List of colour plates 9
Acknowledgments 18
Introduction 21

1. Before 1600        p. 33
2. Saga Books: the ‘Tales of Ise’ and ‘The Thirty-six Immortal Poets’       p. 41
3. Kōetsu-bon: Books conceived as Decorative Art       p. 51
4. Early Seventeenth-century Books after the Saga Press, including tanroku-bon       p. 58
5. Copies from the Chinese in the Mid-Seventeenth Century; the Earliest Colour-printing in Japan       p. 69
6. The Evolution of Ukiyo-e: Hishikawa Moronobu       p. 79
7. Yoshida Hambei       p. 100
8. Kimono Pattern Books of the Seventeenth Century       p. 112
9. Sugimura Jihei, Furuyama Moroshige and Ishikawa Tomonobu       p. 118
10. Torii Kiyonobu and the Kabuki Theatre       p. 133
11. Okumura Masanobu       p. 144
12. Nishikawa Sukenobu       p. 158
13. Ōmori Yoshikiyo, Hasegawa Mitsunobu, Kawashima Nobukiyo and Takagi Sadatake       p. 174
14. The Kanō Strain: Tachibana Morikuni and Ōoka Shumboku       p. 189
15. A New Wave of Chinese Influence in Painting and Colour-printing       p. 202
16. Hanabusa Itchō       p. 216
17. Zenga: Nagasawa Hakuin and Gibon Sengai       p. 226
18. Katsuma Ryūsui and Further Developments in Colour-printing       p. 235
19. Ukiyo-e Books in the 1750s; Ishikawa Toyonobu       p. 250
20. More Chinese Influences: the Nagasaki School: Kanyōsai and Sō Shiseki       p. 258
21. Other Books inculcating Chinese Painting Styles: Ransai, Fuyō, Tōkei and Gentai; the Making of a Gafu       p. 272
22. Tsukioka Settei, Shimokobe Shūsui and Abe Gyokuwanshi       p. 284
23. Exceptional Techniques: Sekkōsai Tokinobu, Tachibana Minkō and Itō Jakuchū       p. 298
24. Suzuki Harunobu       p. 317
25. Katsukawa Shunshō and Ippitsusai Bunchō       p. 330
26. Kitao Shigemasa and the Seirō Bijin Awase Sugata Kagami (with Shunshō)       p. 348
27. Isoda Koryūsai       p. 362
28. Kitao Masanobu and the Kyōka Craze       p. 372
29. Torii Kiyonaga       p. 382
30. Diablerie and Macabre: Toriyama Sekien and Katsukawa Shunei       p. 394
31. Kitagawa Utamaro: Earlier Works       p. 408
32. Some More Kyōka Anthologies of the 1790s: Kubo Shunman, Tsutsumi Tōrin and the Tsutsumi School       p. 432
33. Shunchō, Eishi, Gabimaru and Chōki       p. 449
34. Keisai Masayoshi       p. 465
35. Katsushika Hokusai: Earlier Works       p. 489
36. Further Contacts with the West: Shiba Kōkan       p. 511
37. The Impact of Shijō: Goshun and Haiku Anthologies       p. 521
38. Early Masterpieces of Maruyama and Shijō Art: Yamaguchi Soken and Saitō Shūho       p. 532
39. Haiga: Chō Gesshō and Tatebe Sōchō       p. 549
40. Topographical Guides (Meisho-ki)       p. 560
41. The Later Kabuki Stage in Edo       p. 573
42. The Later Kabuki Stage in Osaka       p. 586
43. Toba-e: Matsuya Jichōsai       p. 599

VOLUME TWO

44. Nanga at its Zenith: Buson, Taiga, Baitei and Chikudō       p. 617
45. More Nanga Artists: Tani Bunchō, Unshitsu, Baikan and Bōsai       p. 634
46. Homage to Great Artists of the Past: Tanyū and Shōkadō       p. 647
47. The Rimpa Revival: Hōchū, Hōitsu and Minwa       p. 654
48. The Nenju-gyōji, ‘Events of the Year’, Genre; Toyokuni, Utamaro, Toyohiro and Shungyōsai       p. 670
49. Kawamura Bumpō and Kawamura Kihō       p. 686
50. More Followers of Ōkyo and Goshun       p. 704
51. The Illustration of Novels: Hokusai, Toyohiro, Shigenobu and Taito II       p. 717
52. Some Anthologies of Haiku Verse and Picture       p. 730
53. Satō Suiseki, Yamanaka Shōnen and Murata Kagen       p. 752
54. Ōnishi Chinnen and Suzuki Nanrei       p. 768
55. More Gafu and Ehon       p. 780
56. Kachō-e and Natural History Books       p. 800
57. Manga       p. 813
58. Nineteenth-century Anthologies with Prints by Ukiyo-e Artists       p. 827
59. Nineteenth-century Landscape by Ukiyo-e Artists       p. 849
60. The Cult of Fuji       p. 870
61. Picture-books of Warriors: Hokusai, Hokkei and Kuniyoshi       p. 884
62. Nineteenth-century Erotica up to 1868       p. 894
63. Later Shijō and Nanga Books, 1835–68       p. 914
64. The Western Invasion: Yokohama-e: Gountei Sadahide       p. 925
65. The Meiji Period, 1868–1911: Kyōsai, Yoshitoshi and Others       p. 936
66. The Meiji Period, 1868–1911: Nanga and Shijō Artists       p. 959
67. Neo-Rimpa: the Continuing Decorative Tradition: Kamisaka Sekka, Kaigai Tennen and Seizei Kigyoku       p. 975
68. The Twentieth Century: Transitional Styles and Shin Hanga       p. 987
69. The Modern ‘Creative’ Woodcut Book: Sōsaku Hanga       p. 1013
70. Designs for Covers and Wrappers       p. 1048

Glossary 1062
Periods of Japanese History since AD 794       p. 1066
Bibliography 1067
Index of Japanese Artists named in the Text       p. 1079
Index of Japanese Illustrated Books referred to in the Text       p. 1101
General Index       p. 1127

In this collection, see [SVJP-0076.2014]:

PLATE 48 on p. 365-6. Isoda Koryusai. Lovers on a verandah. From Enshoku Hō ya Hō (艶色宝屋宝, Sensual Colours: A Phoenix Released in a Field), c. mid-1770s. The picture of the lovers on a verandah beyond chrysanthemums growing in the garden, from one of these large-scale albums is a wonderful composition, the entangled limbs, the rippling patterns of the clothes, the feathery forms of the blooms, weave around the rigid verticals and diagonals of the framework of the house, the engawa (縁側) and the garden fence. …The women’s coiffure is in the transitional stage of 1775/6, between the drawn-back fashion of Harunobu’s time and the full-blown torobin (とろびん) of about the late 1770s.