Yoshitoshi’s One Hundred Aspects of the Moon
Redmond, WA: San Francisco Graphic Society, 1992. First Edition. Folio, 272 pages, publisher's original color pictorial dust jacket with the original price of $75 unclipped. Publisher's original gilt-lettered and decorated black cloth covered boards. Color pictorial endpapers and profusely illustrated throughout in full color. Yoshitoshi’s One Hundred Aspects of the Moon is John Stevenson’s authoritative and beautifully produced study of Tsukioka Yoshitoshi’s renowned late-career series Tsuki Hyakushi, created between 1885 and 1892. The volume reproduces all one hundred designs and places each image within its literary, historical, religious, or folkloric context, explaining the samurai episodes, courtly legends, ghost stories, poetic references, and scenes from Japanese and Chinese tradition that inspired Yoshitoshi. Throughout the series, the moon appears as a recurring symbol of beauty, transience, solitude, fate, and spiritual reflection, sometimes dominating the composition and at other times appearing only indirectly through atmosphere or allusion. Stevenson’s detailed commentary makes the book an essential reference for understanding Yoshitoshi’s imagery, while the large-format color reproductions showcase the artist’s dramatic compositions, expressive figures, refined line work, and innovative use of color. A major work on one of the last great masters of ukiyo-e, the book is especially appealing to collectors of Japanese woodblock prints, Meiji-period art, samurai imagery, folklore, mythology, poetry, and nineteenth-century Japanese culture. Some slight rubbing and wear to the jacket, else in very good + condition. Item #429
Price: $150.00