"Floating world picture," genre of prints and paintings that showcase the "floating," contrived world of pleasure and entertainment during the Edo period; common subjects are kabuki actors, courtesans, landscape views, and erotic scenes.
Translated as pictures of the floating, or sorrowful, world. The Japanese art of Ukiyo-e developed in the city of Edo (now Tokyo) during the Tokugawa or Edo Period (1615-1868).Although Ukiyo-e was initially considered "low" art, by and for the non-elite classes, its artistic and technical caliber is consistently remarkable. Ukiyo-e presented both the historical and all that was current, fashionable, chic, and popular. In the hands of the Ukiyo-e artist, the ordinary was transformed into the extraordinary. The art of the woodblock is exemplified in Ukiyo-e.
Literally, "pictures of the floating world." A genre of art depicting the lives of early modern Japanese that reached its culmination in the mid- to late Tokugawa period.
These Japanese pictures (17th to 19th centuries) celebrated the culture of the Yoshiwara (brothel) quarter of Edo (Tokyo). Geishas were favorite subjects, but so were landscapes and scenes from historical legends, epics, and folktales.
Colourful woodblock prints or paintings which became particularly popular in the late eighteenth century.
The classic Japanese form of woodblock printing, historically used for making large quantities of popular images. In this type of relief printing, many individual blocks of wood are carved and then fitted together to form the printing surface. The use of water-based inks results in delicate, translucent colors similar to the effects of watercolor painting. The printing paper is placed on top of the inked blocks, and an impression is made by hand rubbing with a baren, rather than using a press.
A school of Japanese woodblock printing arising in the EDO period that captured images of everyday life in the FLOATING WORLD ( ukiyo). The greatest ukiyo-e artists include Moronbu (c.1618-c.1694), Harunobu (1725-1770), and Hiroshige (1979-1858).
Prints of the Floating World.
wood block prints, "floating world pictures"
"pictures of the floating world", images of frivolous subjects (e.g., portraits of famous actors and courtesans, images of popular places, fashion plates); real-life ukiyo-e was used as a source of inspiration, but nothing like that will appear in Rokugan for several hundred years.
'Pictures of the floating world'. Prints and paintings showing the transient life, the 'floating world' of the urban population of the Edo period (1600-1868).
Japanese woodblock prints (or woodcuts) and paintings produced between the 17th and the 20th centuries, featuring motifs of landscapes, the theatre and pleasure quarters. It is the main artistic genre of woodblock printing in Japan.
