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Meiji prints

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	Design:	Yamamoto Shōun (1870-1965)
	Album/series title:	Shiki no Nagame (Scenes of the four seasons)
	Size:	24.2 x 17.8 cm
	Photography:	Jacques Commandeur

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Enlargement

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This is the front cover of Yamamoto Shōun’s Shiki no Nagame album published in 1906 by Matsuki Heikichi.

Name of the album (in the middle) and artist (on the right) on the coloured slip of paper^*):

Character	Reading	Meaning	Translation
四	shi	four
季	ki	seasons
能	no	’s
な	na
可	ga		Scenes of the
免	me	scenes	four seasons
昇	shō	rise
雲	un	cloud	By the brush of
筆	hitsu	brush	Shōun

The Shiki no Nagame album lacks a separate table of contents print. This makes sense since - unlike in the other folding albums - the Japanese title of each print is already mentioned in its right margin cartouche.

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References

• Abe, Setsuko. Yamamoto Shōun. Prints of beautiful women of new customs and manners. Andon 41, 1992, pp. 19-21.

• Harris, Frederick. Yamamoto Shōun (1870-1965). Andon 66, 2000, pp. 28-36.

• Hokkaidō Obihiro Museum Of Art (1998). Meiji no ukiyo-e hanga (Ukiyo-e woodblock prints of the Meiji period). Hokkaidō: Hokkaidō Obihiro Museum Of Art and Hokkaidō Shinbun Press.

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

• Narazaki, Muneshige, ed. (1990). Ukiyo-e Masterpieces in Western collections. The Robert O. Muller Collection. Tokyo: Kodansha International.

• Newland, Amy Reigle (2021). Printed and painted. The Meiji art of Ogata Gekkō (1859-1920). Leiden: Hotei Publishing.

• Ōta Memorial Museum of Art (2006). Yamamoto Shōun. Special Exhibition Collection of the Museum of Art, Kochi. Tokyo: Ōta Memorial Museum of Art.

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Provenance: The Art Shop Ezoshi in Kyoto, with many thanks to Chris Uhlenbeck of Hotei Japanese Prints for finding this album for me during his autumn 2025 visit to Japan

^*) With many thanks to Naoko and Shinji Ōba for their help in translating all the Japanese text in this album.