(b Edo [now Tokyo], 1790; d 1848). Japanese painter and woodblock-print designer. Having first studied under Kano Hakkeisei (Jikeisai), he became acquainted c. 1810 with the Kano-style painter Kikukawa Eiji and his son Kikukawa Eizan (1787–1867), a ukiyoe (‘pictures of the floating world’) artist, at that time producing pictures of beautiful women (bijinga) in the style of KITAGAWA UTAMARO. Eisen’s early works in this genre show Eizan’s influence. Eisen subsequently specialized in bijinga and shunga (‘spring paintings’, erotic pictures). Eisen’s style depicting women, which began to appear around 1821, is characterized by straight lines varying in thickness, sharp angular lines and fine details. Distinctive facial features such as long, slanting eyes, contracted eyebrows and half-open lips touched with green contribute to a strong-minded and vivacious female image. Examples include a series of half-length portraits (okubi-e) from the early 1820s entitled Contest of Contemporary Beauties (Ukiyo fuzoku mime kurabe). Eisen later returned to full-length figures. Works of the later 1820s also employed Western-style techniques, such as the use of fine parallel lines for shading. In this period, Eisen began to design landscapes and courtesan prints using shades of blue, known as the aizurie (‘blue-printed pictures’). In 1835, Eisen began the series Sixty-nine Stations of the Kisokaido (Kisokaido rokujukyu tsugi; late 1830s; London, BM), which was completed by ANDO HIROSHIGE. A major late work was the series commonly known as Beautiful Women of the Tokaido (Bijin Tokaido), which features full-length female figures in the foreground and landscape backgrounds. Eisen was also a writer, producing both illustrations and text. In early books, the figure, animal and plant depictions reveal an indebtedness to KATSUSHIKA HOKUSAI, which Eisen himself acknowledged. Later in life, he turned increasingly to writing popular novelettes and other works. Eisen was also author of the Zoku ukiyoe ruiko (Compendium of ukiyoe, 2nd series), a re-editing of the major sources for the history of ukiyoe.

• Ikeda Eisen
  • Japan, §XVII, 2(iii): Painting treatises: Other schools
  • Titles, §2(ii): Japan