The Prints of Tsukioka Kôgyo
Tsukioka Kôgyo (1869–1927), was a master of the Japanese wood block print at the turn of the twentieth century. Taught by his step-father, the highly regarded Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (1839–1892), Kôgyo is now beginning to receive the serious attention of collectors, curators, and scholars. This exhibition showcases Kôgyo’s remarkably colorful images of Noh theater, a traditional form of Japanese performing arts. Kôgyo’s work on Noh covers several decades and illustrates virtually the entire range of Noh repertory since the Meiji period (1868–1912), creating an artistically elegant and beautiful record of this theatrical genre’s customs and performances.
“We were struck by the beauty of Kôgyo’s prints as artworks, not just as historical documents,” says Dick Smethurst, professor of Japanese history at the University of Pittsburgh. “They stand in their own light as works of art.” Mae Smethurst, professor of East Asian language and literature at the University of Pittsburgh, adds that with the opening of Japan to the West, Kôgyo himself was influenced by Western art, and incorporated these new perspectives into the tradition of the Japanese print. The more than 70 prints in the exhibition will also include a small selection of Kôgyo’s bird and nature prints and a few examples of his rarely shown paintings.
The Prints of Tsukioka Kôgyo is organized by the Frick Art & Historical Center and curated by Richard Smethurst, Mae J. Smethurst, Thomas Rimer, and Robert Schaap. The exhibition is made possible, in part, through the generosity of the Japan Foundation, the Townsend and Frances Burden Foundation, and members of the Frick Art & Historical Center.
A brochure for this exhibition has been made possible by the Asian Studies Center, University Center for International Studies, University of Pittsburgh.
Education programs for this exhibition are co-sponsored by the Asian Studies Center, University Center for International Studies, University of Pittsburgh.
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The prints of Tsukioka Kôgyo.pdf