Ukiyo E Research Paper

Words: 544
Pages: 3

Art Nouveau Ukiyo-e

As we all know japan is a major contributor of art , entertainment , tourism in the modern age and their history is what made them today one of these great achievements is the art of the Ukiyo-e it explains why they are so well know for their skilled workmanship and technical expertise . The Term Ukiyo means the floating world and E means picture . Ukiyo-e is an idea which reflected the hedonistic and carefree lifestyles of Japan's ever rising middle class . Woodblocks has been created in the Japanese culture in the early of the 8th century BC . At that time they were used mostly to reproduce Buddhist seals , images and scriptural text.

By the early 17th century an artist named Tawaraya Sotatsu began using woodblocks to print detailed artistic design on paper and silk even though the first master of the ukiyo-e print was Hishikawa Moronobu . At the beginning of the 17th century when woodblock has just begun Japan had reached a turning point after years of war which is called the Sengoku era where it was a civil war between clans nation wide . In the end they achieved peace and prosperity under the rule of one of the major warring clans the Tokugawa family.
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Ukiyo prints became popular between 1615-1858 they were most popular among merchants the lowest class of Japan's Confucian social hierarchy at the time . The Ukiyo prints became famous in Europe and North America . Ukiyo prints were originally ignored and the unwanted prints were wrapped with goods and shipped to other continents . Initially they were almost unnoticed among the Asian artifacts flooding into Europe but when these prints were discovered by the art world exhibition were quickly