Pictures of the Floating World: An Introduction to Japanese Prints

Great book! I saw this in the gift shop at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. I would have bought it but the only one they had left was the display model and it was looking "very well handled," by the time I got to it. I forgot for a time, but something reminded me and I looked it up and found it on Amazon. This style of art has always spoken to me. It sits on my coffee table, I'll slide it out of the protective cover, maybe read a description or two, and flip through a couple of pages, looking at the art. It just brings a smile to my face and I appreciate the artistry and work, the beauty that we (humans), can create!

This book comes in a slipcase and 3 separate prints. The reproductions are exceptionally well done.

Great content, well written, amazing paper/binding.

I had the opportunity to view this book at the local art museum prior to purchase. I love the unusual binding, beautiful pictures, and easily understood information and history concerning Japanese woodblock prints. Perfect for someone with limited knowledge in the genre.

A review on Sarah E. Thompson’s “Pictures of the Floating World: An Introduction to Japanese Prints”TL;DR: Good overview of ukiyo-e woodblock prints, but pictures too small.I bought this book alongside Thompson’s Hokusai book (you can see my glowing review of that book in my profile) for an introduction to ukiyo-e works in general. I was thoroughly impressed by her Hokusai book so I had high expectations for this book too.This book begins with a short history of Edo-period Japan and its entertainment evolution. Edo’s “floating-world,” i.e. a pleasure-motivated, ephemeral world, gave rise to a new category of art dedicated to capturing these ephemeral pleasures. This category was mostly drawn in the woodblock-print medium. Thompson then provides us with a history of woodblock prints, starting with the monochromatic ones to the hand-painted ones and finally to the full-colour prints that we associate today with ukiyo-e. Lastly, she provides an overview of ukiyo-e subject matter: fashion, warrior tales, bird-and-flower pictures, landscapes, and folklore-inspired illustrations. The remaining bulk of this book follows the format of illustration with commentary. Each page features one print alongside Thompson’s commentary.PROS: Good commentary over a wide-range of artists.Just like with her Hokusai book, Thompson provides excellent commentary and explanations for each of the prints. She talks about what is happening in the print, its historical context, and any artistic techniques being used. Her detailed insight is also much appreciated, especially on the “people” prints (women, samurai, kabuki actors, etc.) To me, as someone who is just learning about prints, all the “people” pictures look more or less the same. This is highlighted by Thompson herself, who notes that “people” prints have a certain stereotype or beauty-standard to conform to. Nevertheless, she provides ways that we can differentiate the different “people” prints, whether that’s through a unique use of brushstrokes, the forehead size, or bodily proportions.I also greatly appreciate her prints selection. She selects prints from all kinds of artists, not just the most well-known Kuniyoshi, Kunisada, Hokusai, and Hiroshige, although these four artists do appear the most for obvious reasons.CONS: The prints are too small!The major drawback of this book is its size. The small-ish size comes in handy, but that also means that the illustrations are so small. Sometimes, this book will feature an entire triptych of prints, but this triptych only takes up one-third of a single page. It is an impossibly small reproduction of a respectably large piece of work, so much so that you cannot even read the Japanese writing in the cartouche of the print. I would have much rather appreciated another giant book like Thompson’s Hokusai book so we can see all the details of the print.Another drawback of this book is the binding. It uses the traditional Japanese-style binding: a couple holes are punched into the left margin, a bit like for a three-ringed binder, and thread is used to pull all the pieces of paper together. The novelty binding is cool, until it is not. Because the pages are clamped together along the margin, the book doesn’t sit flat. The pages are also folded in a way such that only one side of the page is used and the other side remains blank. Granted, the blank sides are hidden inside the fold. It creates a pretty cool effect, but quite a waste of paper.Final remarks:I love Thompson’s writing, but the small size of this book isn’t very good for viewing the prints. The workaround is easy – just pull up an image on Google and zoom in – but this solution is hardly ideal. I would keep this book just for Thompson’s commentary alone, but it’s not the best display of the prints at all.

This book is beautifully produced, though I was expecting it to be a larger size. But, it did satisfy my addiction for Japanese Art, AKA Eye Candy, which I absolutely love. The prints are stunning, both in composition and palettes used.

Great material and book design.

A beautifully presented slip case cord bound book of the floating world art form. Good selection of pictures and artists and wellnwritten to be authoritative but never condescending. 8f there was a slight gripe preventing 5 stars it is simply that it is rather expensive for its size in relation to similar books.