From Hiroshige to Monet: Interpretation of Japanese Prints in Impressionism

Inspiration is a form of reinterpretation: the artist captures key elements of the model while adding a change. This can partly explain how art and artistic movements evolve and transition.

In the Edo period (1603-1868), the old name of the capital Tokyo, Japan, closed its borders to the outside world and rediscovered its national artistic identity. The Ukiyo-e style, translatable as “images from the floating world” developed. It represents the colourful world of actors, merchants, courtesans (the famous geishas). When Japan opened up again, these images spread in the West through elaborate and refined prints on wooden blocks.

In 1867, 100 Japanese Ukiyo-e engravings were put on display and sold at the Universal Exhibition in Paris. These prints thrilled the Impressionists, for the subjects and especially for aesthetic aspects: the shots with an unusual cut, the simple and refined colour ranges, and the total lack of chiaroscuro.

Claude Monet (1840-1926) was the French impressionist artist who most collected Japanese prints. His collection included prints by Kitagawa Utamaro (1753-1806), Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) and Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858), overall acquiring 117 out of the 211 exhibited in Paris.

His favorite subject was nature, which, after moving in 1883 to Giverny, in the Parisian countryside, he had the opportunity to observe in all seasons. There he created a garden that was an hymn to nature. He took care of its entire design, making it Japanese-like: ponds with water lilies and small streams made the place peaceful.

Stylistically, Monet immediately registered his sensation with impulsive brushstrokes, directly on the canvas and without preparatory drawings. This peculiar technique was accompanied by the arrival of tube painting, which favoured painting en plein air. He was also very attentive to variations in light.

It is in this oneiric setting that Monet repeatedly painted a Japanese garden with a bridge, one of his water lilies, which clearly recalls Utagawa Hiroshige’s view of “Bamboo quay from Kyoobashi bridge” (1857). Together with Hokusai, Hiroshige is considered one of the major Japanese landscape painters of the 19th century and among the most famous representatives of the Ukiyo-e artistic movement.

In his Japanese-style water park full of water lilies, Monet focuses on the play of light reflected on the water surface, calling into question the traditional linear perspective. Here the colours of water lilies and water are merged into fluid brush strokes. The flowers, now unmade, seem to be brush strokes floating on the surface of the painting.

Published by Luna Silvestri

She/Her. Luna is an Art History student at the University of Glasgow. She is interested in the promotion of cultural awareness through education, and wants to learn more on the legality of restitution of cultural goods.