Mokugo nihon gashū 黙語日本画集

FSC-GR-780.41

Commentary by Erin Schoneveld

Posted August 11, 2016

The posthumously published Mokugo nihon gashū (A collection of Japanese-style painting by Mokugo) gathers together a selection of paintings and graphic works by the artist Asai Chū. The name Mokugo in the title is a reference to Asai’s pseudonym (gō); this book was created as a companion to the Mokugo zuanshū (FSC-GR-78.40), which focuses on Asai’s design work.

The preface of the book states that while Asai’s Japanese-style painting (nihonga 日本画) will never surpass his expertise in Western-style painting (yōga 洋画), the works in this compendium demonstrate his natural artistic talent, in particular, during the last few years of his life, when his brushwork was strikingly beautiful and greatly appreciated.

Friends of the artist and members of the Mokugokai (Mokugo Association) commissioned this book of drawings and paintings as well as the Mokugo zuanshū. The publisher, Unsōdō, was known for its specialization in fine art and luxury pattern books produced to high standards in terms of carving and printing. [1] Unsōdō also printed numerous books of painting collections by eminent Kyōto artists such as Asai Chū. [2]

This book demonstrates Asai’s impressive artistic range in the treatment of Japanese subject matter, media, and genres, both traditional and modern: landscapes, religious and folk art, flower-and-bird painting, even comic portraits of daily life. Mokugo nihon gashū includes seven color woodblock-printed illustrations alongside eighty-two black-and-white photomechanically produced images of original drawings, paintings, and sketches by the artist. It serves as an important reference to one of Japan’s most talented artists of the Meiji period (1868–1912).

Selected readings

Kendall H. Brown, “Prints and Modernity: Developments in the Early Twentieth Century,” in Amy Reigle Newland, ed., The Hotei Encyclopedia of Japanese Woodblock Prints, 2 vols. (Amsterdam: Hotei Publishing, 2005), vol. 1, 279–93.

Helen Merritt, Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: The Early Years (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1990).

Helen Merritt and Nanako Yamada, Guide to Modern Japanese Woodblock Prints: 1900–1975 (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1992).

Chris Uhlenbeck, “Unsōdō,” in Amy Reigle Newland, ed., The Hotei Encyclopedia of Japanese Woodblock Prints, 2 vols. (Amsterdam: Hotei Publishing, 2005), vol. 2, 501.

Copies in other collections
British Library, London
British Museum, London
Cornell University Library, Ithaca
National Diet Library (NDL), Tokyo
University of Washington Library, Seattle
Waseda University Library

[1] Brown 2005, 281.
[2] Uhlenbeck 2005, vol. 2, 501.