Shunga, such as the famous Japanese erotic pillow books, also known
euphemistically as 'spring images', were vibrant, curious and explicit
documents of sexual life, designed to inform, thrill and entertain.
This book presents a comprehensive modern study on Japanese erotic art,
illustrating a large selection of the best works from public and
private collections from around the world. Far from being a separate
genre, Shunga constitutes at least half of the output of all ukiyo-e
art, and often the largest part of any given artist's production.
Artists such as Edgar Degas, Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin among
others were known for their love of Shunga prints and were influenced
by the unusual framing and arbitrary colors of Japanese printing
methods. Shunga notably came to the West during the Art Nouveau period
when collecting Japanese prints became popular, and traces of Shunga
styles and elements have visibly influenced this artistic period.
The most famous and recognizable shunga work is Hokusai's depiction
of a young woman being ravished by an octopus in his album 'Pining for
Love'. Compared to Western perceptions of the nude and its associations
with sex and the Christian concept of original sin, mere nakedness held
little erotic interest to the Japanese viewer. This explains why
Japanese erotica is so extreme in its sexual depictions and why many of
the prints, paintings and scrolls illustrated in this book depict
clothed or half clothed figures. Some Shunga images illustrate famous
tales, while others present unrelated sequences of sexual tableaux,
often depicting all ages from virginal teenagers to old married
couples, as well as all types of sexual activities, be it masturbation,
heterosexual, homosexual or group sex. Much if not most Shunga was
published in book form, as opposed to the single sheets that dominate
the 'normal' ukiyo-e market, which allowed pictures to be easily
carried about and, importantly, stored unobtrusively. This is the case
of Utamaro's famous album, 'Poem of the Pillow', which is reproduced in
this publication in its entirety, as are many albums notably by
Hokusai, Harunobu, Kuniyoshi and many others.
The book also illustrates some of the rarer Shunga works such as the
beautiful handscrolls made by such artists as Kyonobu, Sukenobu and
Shuncho. These demonstrate particularly the expressive vibrancy of
color and interest in surface pattern that are aesthetically important
in the Japanese print. Gian Carlo Calza's insightful text is
accompanied by 350 color images, offering a great variety of examples
from traditional Japanese erotica. The book comprises of a general
introduction which sets the artists and their work in their social,
historical and artistic context. The book is then organized by artist
with a short text on each artist, introducing the illustrated works.
The author references the latest in art historical scholarship, but
this book is also aimed at readers who may not have specialist
knowledge or extensive familiarity with Japanese culture.
About The Author: Gian Carlo Calza is Professor of East Asian Art History and Director
of the International Hokusai Research Centre at the University of
Venice. A distinguished authority on Japanese art, he has published
many books and articles on several artists, including Phaidon's
monograph on Hokusai (2003), as well as Phaidon's Ukiyo-e (2005) and
Japan Style (2007).
Industry Reviews
'Sooner or later, someone was going to publish a high-end, no-holes-barred tome on Japanese Shunga. I'm glad it was Phaidon, they have a well-deserved reputation for producing beautiful books on art. And if you want to buy a beautiful book about beautiful books about elegant oriental sex, then this is the one. Even in these straightened times, thirty quid doesn't seem like a lot for such a fabulous production. - The design is immaculate and the choice of artists exemplary. - Gian Carlo Calza's extravagant production is delightful because it actually gives us the plates from the pillow books in their entirety, rather than as a selected group of images. Henri Breton, Erotic Review, June 2010 'a testament to the beauty and historical appeal of Japanese erotic art - With its carefully cropped cover image, its coy title, its handsome binding and general air of art and historical delicacy, this beautiful and astonishing book is an accident waiting to happen. I picture a branch of Waterstone's, in one of the more genteel market towns, and elderly lady with an interest in the arts of the East. Book token in hand, she opens Poem of the Pillow with refined excitement, anticipating familiar Japanese subjects - haughty samurai, putting kabuki actors, and geisha in brocade kimono. Imagine her reaction when she finds all of them, not the conventional poses of the woodblock print, but boffing each other's brains out. - the most profound and beautiful pornography the world has yet seen - this book [ - ] testif[ies] to the growing respectability of shunga, and a renewed appreciation of their beauty, inventiveness and historical interest. - there are plenty of women on top, much tenderness (expressed in the delicate glances of lovers and the poems and speech bubbles that encircle many of the images) - and much straightforward pleasure, female as well as male. - Like no other visual art, these pictures dramatise the psychological of reality of intense sexual arousal, when the whole universe, everything that matters, seems to be concentrated in those inches of engorged flesh. After examining a book like this, you will never look at your own, or anyone else's, in quite the same way again. - [the] attention to the real, the sense of everyday life being lived in the background, [ - ] elevates these pictures from the level of masturbation aids to the status of true art; and that mouth-watering quality shared by the best Japanese prints - of a visible world made palpable, almost edible, charged with human tenderness, and the joyful relish of being alive.' Richard Lloyd Parry, The Times, 21 August 2010
