Koizumi Kishio

Koizumi Kishio 小泉癸巳男
Born1893
DiedDecember 1945(1945-12-00) (aged 51–52)
Notable workShowa Dai-Tokyo hyaku zue 昭和大東京百図会 (One Hundred Pictures of Great Tokyo in the Showa Era)
MovementSōsaku-hanga (Creative Print)

Koizumi Kishio (小泉癸巳男; 1893-1945) was a woodblock print artist and member of the creative print movement or sōsaku hanga in the early to mid-twentieth century. He is most famously known for his series: "One Hundred Pictures of Great Tokyo in the Showa Era (Showa dai Tōkyō hyakkei zue)" which he made between 1928 and 1940 (not to be confused with the multi-artist series "One Hundred Pictures of New Tokyo", created by eight of Koizumi's contemporaries including Kōshirō Onichi and Senpan Maekawa).

Koizumi's work depicts the rapidly modernising city of Tokyo and its recovery in the years following the Great Kantō earthquake in September 1923.[1] Koizumi is also recognised for his technical publication on woodblock printing published in 1924 entitled 'The Method of Cutting and Printing Woodblock Prints' Mokuhanga no horikata to surikata', and this textbook was used by many of his colleagues and fellow woodblock artists.[2]

Biography

Koizumi was born in 1893, in Shizuoka, Japan during the late Meiji period. His father, Koizumi Ken'kichi, was a master calligrapher and had many connections with contemporary artists. From a young age Koizumi learned from his father's woodblock cutter Horigoe Kan'ichi before moving to Tokyo to continue his studies in woodblock printing under Ishii Hakutei and Maruyama Banka at the Japan Watercolour Institute (Nihon Suisaiga-kai) primarily focused on Western art techniques.[2]

By 1914, Koizumi had begun working alongside creative print artists, such as Kogan Tobari, being recognised for his traditional carving technique-style.[3][4] Koizumi joined the Japan Creative Print Association (Nihon Sosaku Hanga Kyokai) in 1919, after it had been established the year prior[5], participating in its first exhibition held at the Mitsukoshi department store in Nihonbashi.[6] This is also where Koizumi first exhibited his print recreating the famous Portrait of Beethoven originally by Joseph Karl Stieler in 1820.[7]

Koizumi's early career took a similar path to many other creative print artists, reflecting a general departure from the ukiyo-e tradition through the twentieth century, and also the artistic response to the devastating impact of the Great Kantō Earthquake in 1923. He continued to live in Tokyo for the majority of his life. Like other modern artistic movements in Japan such as Shin-hanga or modern print movement, the creative print movement found its initial foothold in Tokyo, before variations of the movement emerged across the Kansai region.[8][9]

Unlike a group of eight of Koizumi's contemporaries who called themselves Takujōsha or the Table Group, which in 1929 had begun working on a series of prints depicting modernising Tokyo, at around the same time in 1928, Koizumi worked independently on his series: "One Hundred Pictures of Great Tokyo in the Showa Era". This stems from an artistic tradition followed on from nineteenth century ukiyo-e artists, for example, Hiroshige's "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (Meisho Edo Hyakkei)". Koizumi initially completed the series of one hundred prints in 1940, before adding an additional nine prints, and further annotations in the same year.[10][11] Although beginning alongside each other and both considered "grand projects", the one hundred print series by Koizumi was distinctive to the series created by the Table Group and completed in 1932.[1]

Following the Manchurian Incident in 1931, and then the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Koizumi's prints became increasingly militarised and patriotic in tone, depicting soldiers in uniform, military parades and many Japanese flags.[12] The prints also emphasised the Westernisation of Tokyo's transforming infrastructure, and changes in landscape and fashion.[13] Despite the ongoing war, in 1942 Koizumi's series was exhibited in Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama, and it was considered successful with full editions sold through the Asahi newspaper company.[12]

Due to the escalation of the Asia-Pacific War, Koizumi was soon forced to evacuate Tokyo, leaving for Saitama. Koizumi then began a new series in 1942, aspiring to offer a modern interpretation of the 36 views of Mount Fuji, in honour to Hokusai's Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji. He completed 23 of the 36 in the next few years, but ultimately never finished the series. His health quickly declined towards the end of the war, and even though he continued to work after the surrender of Japan in August, Koizumi died at the age of 52 in December 1945, before he could return to Tokyo.[2] In 1946, his work was once again exhibited at the Mitsukoshi department store in Nihonbashi, where all 23 prints of his in-progress series were displayed.[12]

References

  1. ^ a b Raquet, Noëmi; Uhlenbeck, Chris (2009). Urban Landscapes and Leisure: Prints of Modern Tokyo 1910-1940. Exhibition catalogue no.2, autumn 2009. Nihon no hanga. pp. 10–61.
  2. ^ a b c "Koizumi Kishio 小泉癸巳男". The British Museum Collection.
  3. ^ Forty for Forty: Forty Artists, Forty Masterpieces, Celebrating Forty Years. New York: Ronin Gallery. 2015. p. 70.
  4. ^ Merritt, Helen (1990). Modern Japanese woodblock prints: the early years. Honolulu, Hawaii: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 978-0-8248-1200-3.
  5. ^ "版画について考える -101年目の宿題-". 和歌山県立近代美術館 (in Japanese). Retrieved 2026-03-17.
  6. ^ "Scholten Japanese Art | Kishio Koizumi Set of 100 Woodblock Prints". Scholten Japanese Art. Retrieved 2026-03-17.
  7. ^ "Item #95856 Portrait of Beethoven - Artelino". www.artelino.com. Retrieved 2026-03-17.
  8. ^ Uhlenbeck, Chris; de Vries, Maureen; Wessels, Elise (2013). The Kansai View: Prints from Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe. Exhibition Catalogue no.9 spring 2013. Nihon no hanga.
  9. ^ Smith, Lawrence; British Museum, eds. (1994). Modern Japanese prints, 1912-1989: woodblocks and stencils. London: British Museum Press. ISBN 978-0-7141-1461-3.
  10. ^ Ulak, James T. "MIT Visualizing Cultures". visualizingcultures.mit.edu. Retrieved 2026-03-17.
  11. ^ Merritt, Helen; Yamada, Nanako (1999). Guide to modern Japanese woodblock prints: 1900 - 1975 (Paperback ed., [Nachdr.] ed.). Honolulu: Univ. of Hawaii Press. ISBN 978-0-8248-1732-9.
  12. ^ a b c Ulak, James T. "MIT Visualising Cultures - Tokyo Modern I: Koizumi Kishio's "100 Views" of the Imperial Capital (1928-1940)" (PDF).
  13. ^ Morse, Samuel Crowell; Dower, John W.; Barker, Elizabeth E.; Mead Art Museum, eds. (2012). Reinventing Tokyo: Japan's largest city in the artistic imagination ; [exhibition held August 25 to December 30, 2012]. Amherst, Mass. ISBN 978-0-914337-35-5.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
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