ONE HUNDRED ASPECTS

OF THE MOON
By Tsukioka Yoshitoshi

de anima
books
Copyright: De Anima Graphics & Books

ISBN-13: 978-1532914287
ISBN-10: 1532914288

Cover: Claudio Hideki Kurahayashi

Oshi-e art: Kiyomi Hatai Kurahayashi

2016

De Anima Graphics & Books

São Paulo, SP - Brazil

ONE HUNDRED ASPECTS

OF THE MOON
By Tsukioka Yoshitoshi
 About The Work 8
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi’s Life and Career 9

1885

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

20 21 22

1886

23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38

39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46

47 48 49 50 51 52 53
 1887

54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61

62 63 64 65 66 67 68

1888

69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76

77 78 79

1889

80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87

88 89 90 91
 1890

92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99

1891

100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107

108

1892

109 110 111

ONE HUNDRED ASPECTS

OF THE MOON
By Tsukioka Yoshitoshi

de anima
books
T suki Hyakushi (One Hundred Aspects of the
Moon) is a collection of large, moon-themed
nishiki-e (multicolored woodblock prints) by
Tsukioka Yoshitoshi. This series is generally re-
garded today as Yoshitoshi’s greatest achievment.
Many of the prints are masterpieces as good as
anything ever done by any ukiyo-e artist.

The 100 prints were published in batches by Akiya-

ma Buemon between 1885 and 1892. They depict
various aspects of the moon, drawing upon Japa-
nese and Chinese anecdotes, historical events, and
mythology, and relate to a wide range of subjects,
including famous warriors, notable women, birds
and animals, and goblins and ghosts.

The sixth picture, for example, depicts the warlord

Cao Cao (155–220), famous as the main character
in Sanguozhi Tongsu Yanyi (Romance of the Three
Kingdoms), gazing at a full moon on the night be-
fore the Battle of Red Cliffs. The fifty-seventh pic-
ture shows Murasaki Shikibu (born circa 978) at
a mountain temple, deep in thought while look-
ing at the moon. It is said that the idea for Genji
Monogatari (The tale of Genji), came to Murasaki
while she was looking at a full moon from a temple.

This document is a folding book consisting of all

100 prints from Tsuki Hyakushi and two indexes
that were created after the series was completed. It
is believed to have been bound by its former own-
er. A preface that was written at the same time as
the indexes were compiled is not included in the
book. Scholars believe that the order of the pic-
tures in the album does not follow the order in
which they were published, but instead their order
in the indexes, although there are some variations.

8
T sukioka Yoshitoshi was an ukiyo-e artist from
the school of Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797–1861),
active from the Bakumatsu (final years of the Sho-
gunate) into the Meiji Period. He created a wide
range of works, including bijin-ga (pictures of
beautiful women), fuzoku-ga (pictures of manners
and customs), and pictures of historical and liter-
ary characters.
Yoshitoshi’s memorial portrait by Kanaki Toshikage
9
He was born in old Edo, in 1839. His father was a
rich merchant who had bought his way into samu-
rai status, but Yoshitoshi left home at the age of 3
to live with his uncle, a son-less pharmacist, who
was very fond of his nephew.
Yoshitoshi was originally named Owariya Yone-
jiro, and was given the name Yoshitoshi by his
master Kuniyoshi, one of great masters of the Jap-
anese woodblock print, to whom he was appren-
ticed at 11, in 1850. Although he was not seen as
Kuniyoshi’s successor in his lifetime, he is now
recognized as the chief pupil of Kuniyoshi.
His career spanned two eras - the last years of the
old feudal Japan, and the first years of the new
modern Japan. Like many Japanese, while inter-
ested in the new things from the rest of the world,
over time he became increasingly concerned with
the loss of many outstanding things from the tra-
ditional Japan, among them the traditional wood-
block print.
His early work is full of extremely graphic violence
and death, perhaps mirroring the lawlessness and
violence of the Japan around him, which was si-
multaneously going through the breakdown of the
feudal system imposed by the Tokugawa shoguns,
as well as the impact of the West. During this peri-
od his fame grew, and by 1869 he was regarded as
one of the best woodblock artists in Japan.
Shortly thereafter, he ceased to receive comissions,
perhaps because the public were tired of scenes of
violence. By 1871, he became severely depressed,
and his personal life became one of great turmoil,
which was to continue sporadically until his death.
He lived in appalling conditions with his devoted izing Japan. Yoshitoshi insisted on high standards
mistress, Okoto, who sold off her clothes and pos- of production, and helped save it temporarily from
sessions to support him. At one point they were re- degeneracy.
duced to burning the floor-boards from the house
for warmth. In 1880, he met another woman, a former Geisha
with two children, Sakamaki Taiko. They were
His fortunes started to turn by 1873, when his married in 1884, and while he continued to phi-
mood improved, and he started to produce more lander, her gentle and patient manner seems to
prints. Newspapers sprung up in the moderniza- have helped stabilize him.
tion drive, and Yoshitoshi was hired to produced
prints for one. His last years were among his most productive,
with his great series “One Hundred Aspects of the
His financial condition was still precarious, Moon” (1885-1892), and “New Forms of Thirty-Six
though, and in 1876, his mistress Okoto, in a ges- Ghosts” (often called simply “Thirty-Six Ghosts”)
ture of devotion which is typically Japanese, but (1889-1892), as well as some masterful triptychs
hard for us to understand, sold herself to a brothel of kabuki theatre actors and scenes.
to help him.
During this period he also cooperated with his
With the Satsuma Rebellion of 1877, in which the friend, the actor Danjuro, and others, in an at-
old feudal order made one last attempt to stop the tempt to save some of the traditional Japanese
new Japan, newspaper circulation soared, and arts.
woodblock artists were in demand, with Yoshi-
toshi most of all. The prints he did gave him public In his last years, his mental problems started to
recognition, and the money was a help, but it was recur. In early 1891 he invited friends to a gath-
not until 1882 that he was secure. ering of artists that turned out to be a delusion.
After more symptoms, he was admitted to mental
In late 1877, he took up with a new mistress, the hospital. He eventually left, in May 1892, but did
geisha Oraku; like Okotu, she sold her clothes and not return home, instead renting rooms.
possessions to support him, and when they sep-
arated after a year, she too hired herself out to a He died there three weeks later, on June 9, 1892,
brothel. from a cerebral hemorrhage. He was only 53 years
old.
By this point, the woodblock industry was in se-
vere straits. All the great woodblock artists of the During his life, he produced a large number of
early part of the century, Hiroshige, Kunisada, and triptychs, and many series of prints, many of
Kuniyoshi, had all died, and the wooblock print as great merit, including his two best-known, “Thir-
an art form was dying in the confusion of modern- ty-Six Ghosts” and the “One Hundred Aspects of

10
the Moon”. Other less-common ones are almost
equally good, including “Yoshitoshi’s Finest War-
riors”, “A Collection of Desires”, “Eight Elements
of Honor” and “Thirty-Two Aspects of Customs
and Manners” (the latter all series of bijin).

While demand for his prints continued for a few

years, eventually interest in him waned, both in
Japan, and around the world. The canonical view
in this period was that the generation of Hiroshige
was really the last of the great woodblock artists,
and more traditional collectors stopped even ear-
lier, at the generation of Utamaro and Toyokuni.

However, starting in the 1970’s, interest in him

resumed, and reappraisal of his work has shown
the quality, originality and genius of the best of
it, and the degree to which he succeeded in keep-
ing the best of the old Japanese woodblock print,
while pushing the field forward by incorporating
both new ideas from the West, as well as his own
innovations.

Sources:
J. Noel Chiappa
Library of Congress

11
 Cooling off at Shijō

12
 “Full moon
on the tatami mats
Shadows of the pine branches”

Kikaku

13
 Inaba Mountain Moon

14
 The village of the Shi Clan
on a moonlit night

Nine-Dragon Tattoo from

“The Water Margin”

15
 Moonlight patrol

Saitō Toshimitsu

16
 Rising moon over Mount Nanping

Cao Cao

17
 “By now you must be near Komakata
A cuckoo calls”

Takao

18
 The Gion District

19
 Winter moon at Asano river

20
 Chang’e flies to the moon

21
 Mountain moon after rain

Tokimune

22
 A glimpse of the moon

Kaoyo

23
 Cassia-Tree Moon

Wu Gang

24
 Moon at Chikubu Island

Tsunemasa

25
 “On the coast at Kiyomi
even the sky bars the Way
The moon is blocked
by the Miho pine groves”

26
 Dawn moon of the Shinto rites

Festival on a hill

27
 Inamura promontory moon
at daybreak

28
 Moon of Itsukushima

A Muro courtesan

29
 An iron cauldron and the moon at night

Kobuna no Gengo and Shimaya Hanzō

30
 Mount Yoshino midnight moon

Iga no Tsubone

31
 Moon above the sea at Daimotsu bay

Benkei

32
 The Moon of the Milky Way

33
 Moon of the pleasure quarters

34
 Shujaku Gate Moon

Hakuga Sammi

35
 Takakura Moon

Hasebe Nobutsura

36
 Moon of the enemy’s lair

Prince Ousu

37
 Mount Jiming Moon

Zi Fang

38
 Moon over theater district at dawn

39
 Moon and Smoke

40
 Mount Otowa Moon

Bright God Tamura

41
 “How hopeless it is
It would be better for me
to sink beneath the waves
Perhaps then I could see my man
from moon capital”

Ariko

42
 The moon’s inner vision

Te no Yubai

43
 The cry of the fox

44
 Gravemaker Moon

45
 The moon at Ogurusu in Yamashiro

46
 Moon at Yamaki mansion

Kagekado

47
 The moon through
a crumbling window

48
 Kitayama Moon

Toyohara Sumiaki

49
 “I listen to the sound
of the cloth being pounded
As the moon shines serenely
And believe that there is someone else
Who has not yet gone to sleep”

Tsunenobu

50
 The Yūgao Chapter
from “The Tale of Genji”

51
 Faith in the third-day moon

Yukimori

52
 “Glimmers like bright snow
and plum blossoms appear like
reflected stars
Ah! The golden mirror of the moon
passes overhead
as fragrance from the Jade Chamber
fills the garden”

Sugawara no Michizane

53
 “Usually I dislike a cloud sky
Tonight I realize that a cloud sky
makes me appreciate
the light of the moon”

Gen’i

54
 Mount Tobinosu dawn moon

Toda Hanbei Shigeyuki

55
 “In the midst of glimmering whiteness
among the night’s moon-shadows
I part the snow
and pluck plum blossoms”

Fujiwara no Kinto

56
 “The full moon
coming with a challenge
to flaunt its beautiful brow”

Fukami Jikyū

57
 Hazy-Night Moon

Kumasaka

58
 “The night is still
and a hundred flowers
are fragrant in the Western Palace
She orders the screen to be rolled up,
regretting the passing of spring
with the Yunhe across her lap
she gazes at the moon
The colors of the trees are hazy
in the indistinct moonlight.”

Wang Changling

59
 “I wish I had gone to bed immediately
but now the night has passed
and I watch the moon descend.”

Akazome Emon

60
 Lady Gosechi

61
 Huai River Moon

Wu Zixu

62
 Obon Festival Moon

63
 “Like reflections
in the rice-paddies
The faces of streetwalkers
in the darkness
are exposed
by the autumn moonlight”

Hitotose

64
 Sumiyoshi Full moon

Lord Teika

65
 Moon at the helm of a boat

Taira no Kiyotsune

66
 Seson Temple Moon

Captain Yoshitaka

67
 Ishiyama Moon

68
 “In the moonlight under the trees
a beautiful woman comes”

69
 Moon of enlightenment

70
 Joganden Moon

Minamoto no Tsunemoto

71
 “Does the cuckoo also announce
its name from above the clouds?
Yorimasa Extemporizes
I only bent my bow
and the arrow shot itself”

72
 Gojō Bridge Moon

73
 Moon at Katada Bay

Saitō Kuranosuke

74
 Shizu Peak Moon

Hideyoshi

75
 “As I look out into the vast expanse
can this be the same moon
that I saw rise in Kasuga
behind Mount Mikasa?”

76
 The moon over the moor

Yasumasa

77
 Received back into Moon Palace

Bamboo cutter from

“Tale of the Bamboo Cutter”

78
 Reading in moonlight

Zi Lu

79
 Shinobugaoka Moon

Gyokuensai

80
 “Did I ever imagine that as the clouds
of the high autumn sky cleared
I would view the moon
through a bamboo lattice window”

Hidetsugu

81
 “The bottom of the bucket
which Lady Chiyo filled has fallen out
The moon has no home in the water”

82
 Lunacy

Unrolling letters

83
 Jade Rabbit

Sun Wukong
from “Journey to the West”

84
 Mount Miyaji Moon

Moronaga

85
 Rainy Moon

Kojima Takanori

86
 Moon of the filial son

Ono no Takamura

87
 Moon at the Red Cliffs

88
 Moon of the Southern Sea

89
 Dawn moon and tumbling snow

Kobayashi Heihachirō

90
 Mount Ashigara Moon

Yoshimitsu

91
 Cloth-Beating Moon

Yugiri

92
 Hōrin Temple Moon

Yokobue

93
 Moon of lonely house

94
 Kazan Temple Moon

95
 Moon of Kintoki Mountain

96
 “Pleasure is this
To lie cool
under the moonflower bower
The man in his undershirt,
the woman in her slip”

97
 “How noisy, the sound of insects
calling in the meadow
As for me, I make no sound
but think of love”

98
 “Frost fills the camp
and the autumn air is still lines
of returning geese cross
the moon of the third hour”

Kenshin

99
 The Moon’s Four Strings

Semimaru

100
 “Cherry blossom
by the Sumida River
boats fade from view
in the gathering dusk
at Sekiya as I view the moon”

Mizuki Tatsunosuke

101
 Akechi Gidayu prepares himself
for suicide

102
 A Buddhist monk receives
Cassia seeds on a moonlit night

103
 Moon over Chōfu Village

104
 “Since the crescent moon
I have been waiting for tonight”

Old Man

105
 The moon and the
abandoned old woman

106
 Saga Moor Moon

107
 The Moon’s invention

Hōzō Temple

108
 Musashi Plain Moon

109
 Monkey-Music Moon

110
 The Moon at High Tide

111
“Holding back the night
with its increasing brilliance
the summer moon”

Tsukioka Yoshitoshi’s
death poem