How Japanese wood block prints changed the face of art and the Art Nouveau poster.
It would be difficult to look back on modern day art history and not see the influence of the Japanese wood block print. After all, art history in general is nothing more then the domino effect of borrowed ideas, flowing in both directions, influencing everything in its path. .
Japanese Ukiyo-e artists".
like Kitagawa Utamaro,.
Katsushika Hokusai, .
and Ando Hiroshige, with.
their woodblock prints.
of everyday life, changed .
the face of art history.
forever. There simple .
command of color,.
simplification of form,.
broad color fields,.
and the shear power.
of their expressiveness was the fuel that fed the fire that took Europe by storm from the early 18th century on. .
The Japanese prints opened the eyes of European artists to the simple fact that they were still constrained by European conventions. The Japanese print relished every unexpected and unconventional aspect of the world. Hokusai would represent one of his countries greatest landmarks, Mount Fujiyama, as seen by chance from behind scaffolding; Utamaro would not hesitate to show some of his figures cut off by the print margin of a print or a curtain. It was this daring disregard of an elementary rule of European painting that struck the match alight.
The beautifully simple but elegant Japanese woodblock prints captivated European artists". From Degas to Manet, from Whistler to Vangough, and from Beardsley to Toulouse- Lautrec; they all took something from this newfound knowledge and respect for the Japanese print. .
One only has to look as far as Edgar Degas" pastel sketch of ballarinas, "Awaiting the cue". The arrangement of his composition could not be more casual in appearance. Of some of the dancers we see only the legs, of some only the body. This cutting off of the figure can also be seen in Henri de Toulouse- Lautrecs" work, who applied a similar economy of means to the new art of the poster.
