Exhibit of Japanese Prints Opening at Museum

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo., Aug. 9, 2011 – “The Floating World: Ukiyo-e Prints from the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art” will be on display beginning Aug. 23 in the Rosemary Berkel and Harry L. Crisp II Museum at Southeast Missouri State University’s River Campus.

The public is invited to attend an opening reception from 4-8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 2. The exhibit will remain on display through Oct. 23. Admission is free.

This exhibition of 50 Edo period prints reveals an intimate history of Japanese print collecting in the southern United States from the early 20th century. Works encompass themes of beautiful women, actors, theater performances, entertainment, landscapes, narrative scenes and guidebooks incorporating the traditional love of nature. One piece in the Floating World collection, Seiro Niwaka by Hidemaro, served as an advertisement for the annual autumn festival in Yoshiwara Yukwaku district.

Ukiyo-e, meaning “images of the floating world,” refers to the theatre and entertainment districts in Japanese cities, which arose around the official Shogunate municipality. The Edo Period, from 1600-1868, saw the strong emergence of publishing houses, which hired artists to depict an idea, craftsmen to create a drawing for each color, woodcarvers to transfer the drawings to wood panels and a printer to create the final product.

Artists represented include Hiroshige, Hokusai, Utagawa and other important printmakers of the Japanese Edo period. The collection was stored much of the 20th century and has rarely been exhibited outside of Mississippi.

Considered to be one of the last major masters of the Ukiyo-e style, Utagawa Hiroshige (1979-1858) alone produced over 8,000 prints and had an immense effect on landscape painting throughout the world. A student of Utagawa Toyohiro, Hiroshige created one famous series known as “The 53 Post Stations of the Tokaido,” depicting the way stations along the Tokaido highway, the main artery of old Japan. The Hoeido edition of that series, with an astounding 27 works in the Floating World collection, is Hiroshige’s best known. Released in 10 different editions, the series included entirely new images in each set.

Financial assistance for this project has been provided by the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.

The Crisp Museum is located in the Cultural Arts Center at Southeast Missouri State University’s River Campus, 518 S. Fountain St., Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Museum hours: Tuesday-Friday.: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., weekends: 1-4 p.m. For more information, email museum@semo.edu or call (573) 651-2260.