Troubled Times and Beyond

COMING SOON

Troubled Times and Beyond: Japanese Prints 1931-1960

For our tenth catalogue we have decided to look at the production of prints during a period when artists were dealing with the wars Japan was engaged in on the East Asian mainland and the Pacific. During the 1930s Japan was slowly changing into a militaristic nation and the government was coming down hard with censorship on all media, including woodblock prints. Prints produced during the war years are easily marginalized, excluded from artist’s biographies and summaries of their work. This overview of prints shows the early signs of militarism in the 1930s, the strain of militarism and governmental control on woodcuts during the war period and the subsequent unexpected post-war success of Japanese prints abroad as a result of the American influx.