Gekko Ogata – Festival Viewing

Original woodblock print. The first edition of this design was published in 1898. The current print was printed in the Meiji period (1868 – 1912).

Image size (excluding margins): 32.6 * 22.2 cm (12.8 * 8.7 in).

The print is in good condition, but with signs of aging. Remnants of a previous mounting remain in the corners on the back, shining through at the front. There is a slight wrinkle in the upper left corner.

The pictures shown here are from the print itself.

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Gekko Ogata (1859 – 1920) was a self-taught Japanese painter and woodblock artist. He was a prolific artist with a strong work ethic and produced many paintings, woodblock prints, and illustrations for various media. In later years, attention to his works was less than for artists such as Tsukioka Yoshitoshi or Yoshu Chikanobu, but in recent years there has been renewed interest. For an in-depth overview of his life and work, there is an excellent resource in Amy Reigle Newland’s “Printed and Painted. The Meiji Art of Ogata Gekko (1859-1920)”.

His works feature traditional ukiyo-e themes, such as flowers and beautiful women. These prints are typically relatively affordable. Another, more expensive genre, is that of Japanese legends, heroes, and history. For both these genres, we have many woodblock prints on offer, and we hope to add more in the future of his landscape prints and those of other genres.

See an overview of Gekko Ogata's woodblock prints