Watanabe Shōzaburō

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Hashiguchi Goyō : "In the bathroom" (1915)
Watanabe at Itō Shinsui, 1941

Watanabe Shōzaburō ( Japanese 渡邊 庄三郎 ; born June 2, 1885 in Ibaraki Prefecture ; died February 14, 1962 ) was a Japanese publisher of woodblock prints. He suggested the "New Woodcuts" - "Shin-hanga", a stylistic development of the classic Ukiyo-e .

life and work

Watanabe Shōzaburō began his career under Kobayashi Bunshichi (小林 文 七; 1862-1923), where he learned to export prints. He married a daughter of the woodcut tailor Chikamatsu Otohisa (近 松 於 菟 寿;). In 1909 Watanabe opened his own business.

Since the classic ukiyoe woodcuts had gone out of fashion in Japan at the time, but were still in demand by foreigners, Watanabe came up with the idea of ​​using the traditional method of dividing the work of artist as designer, woodcut artist as plate cutter and printer to have prints made with the experience of multicolor printing, which, in contrast to Ukiyo-e, had women and contemporary topics as their content. The first artist that Watanabe was able to win was Hashiguchi Goyō (1880-1921). It was then he who created the first sheet in the style that Watanabe now called “Shin-hanga” - “New Prints”.

Watanabe was then able to win a number of other artists, among which Kawase Hasui (1883–1957) and Itō Shinsui (1898–1972) were very productive. Some foreigners such as the Austrian Friedrich Capelari (1884–1950) were also published by Watanabe with their Japanese motifs. The demand for the Shin-hanga fell sharply after World War II , but interest in them has increased again since the end of the 20th century.

The book "Ukiyoeshi-den" (浮世 絵 師 伝) - "Biography of the Ukiyoe Artists" - written by Watanabe and by Inoue Kazuo (井上 和 雄; 1889–1946) has been the most important work in this field for many years since its publication in 1931 .

Remarks

  1. ↑ Front row: left Kasamatsu Shirō , right Watanabe. Back row from left: Moriyama (Watanabe employee), Kawase Hasui, an American couple, Itō Shinsui and his wife.

literature

  • Okamoto, Hiromi et al. a .: Hanmoto - Watanabe Shōsaburō. In: Kindai Nihon hanga no mikata. Tokyo Bijjutsuin, 2004. ISBN 4-8087-0751-9 .

See also

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Watanabe is the family name, Shōzaburō the first name.
personal data
SURNAME Watanabe, Shōzaburō
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 渡邊 庄三郎 (Japanese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Japanese publisher of colored woodblock prints
DATE OF BIRTH June 2, 1885
PLACE OF BIRTH Ibaraki prefecture
DATE OF DEATH February 14, 1962