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Biography of Kitagawa Utamaro
Name: Kitagawa Utamaro
Birth Date: 1753
Death Date: 1806
Place of Birth: N/A
Nationality: Japanese
Gender: Male
Occupations: printer, artist
Kitagawa Utamaro
Kitagawa Utamaro (1753-1806), one of the greatest masters of the Ukiyo-e school of Japanese wood-block printing, excelled in the exotic portrayal of Japanese women, especially those of the Yoshiwara district. Many contemporary critics regard him as the greatest Japanese printmaker.Like most of the Ukiyo-e artists, Kitagawa Utamaro was a native of Edo (modern Tokyo). His teacher was Toriyama Sekien, but the greatest influence on him was the work of Kiyonaga, the dominant Ukiyo-e artist of his youth. Utamaro's talent was discovered while he was still very young by the discriminating publisher Tsuta-ya Juzaburo, who brought out many of his prints. The most outstanding of Utamaro's early works are his illustrated books, the finest of which are the albums of insects, shells, and birds published between 1787 and 1791 and reflecting the influence of the Dutch scientific publications which were entering Japan through the port of Nagasaki.During the 1790s Utamaro reached his …showed first 150 words…
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…showed last 150 words…are most fully expressed.While Utamaro's subjects by and large were taken from the general repertoire of the Ukiyo-e school, it was in the style and design of his prints that he surpassed his contemporaries and followers. His use of line and color and his feeling for pattern and composition reveal a master who produced some of the finest wood blocks ever made. However, his late work shows a certain decadence and overrefinement, a tendency further accentuated in the work of his followers; yet at the height of his power he was one of the greatest of Japanese artists, and it is not pure chance that the French impressionists, notably Édouard Manet, Edgar Degas, and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, were great admirers of his work. Further Reading Studies of Utamaro and his work include Yone Noguchi, Utamaro (1925); Ichitaro Kondo, Kitagawa Utamaro, 1753-1806 (1956); and Jack R. Hillier, Utamaro: Colour Prints and Paintings (1961).
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