Nishimuraya Yohachi (dates unknown)"Mr. Edmonds, the cataloguer at Sotheby’s before the Second World War, seems to have been the first to suggest, in a catalogue of 1912, that Eijudō was born in 1729 and would therefore be seventy-one by Japanese reckoning, in 1799. 1799 is a plausible date for the print, but Edmunds cited no source for his information about the year of Eijudō's birth, and no recent Japanese scholar has proposed a date." (Museum Angewandte Kunst) was one of the leading publishers of woodblock prints in late 18th-century Japan.Newland 2003, 475 He founded the Nishimuraya Yohachi publishing house, also known as Nishiyo (西与),Newland 2003, 175 which operated in Nihonbashi's Bakurochō Nichōme under the shop name Eijudō. The firm's exact dates are unclear, but many art historians date its activity to between .Pushkin State Museum; Japanese PrintsNewland is less precise, describing Nishimuraya as active from the "mid-eighteenth to mid-nineteenth century (2003, 475); Machotka chooses the period (2009, 64), and Volker insists on 1738-1818 (1949, 20).
According to Andreas Marks, Nishimuraya is "one of the most important publishers in the history of prints and may be the publisher with the biggest output over time," attributing his success to "engaging the best artists and providing a broad range of prints to satisfy the public's interest."Marks One of the press' most significant products was Hokusai's famous Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, which appeared between Newland 2003, 206 and the first two volumes of his exquisite 100 Views of Mount Fuji ehon in 1834 and 1835.Hillier & Smith Nishimuraya Yohachi also published prints by Eishi, Kuniyasu, Toyokuni I and Kunisada,Japanese Prints as well as Koryūsai's Hinagata wakana no hatsumoyo (1776–81), an ōban-format series of 140 prints considered the longest bijin-ga series ever produced.
Nishimuraya is immortalized in the 1787 print Eijudō Hibino at Seventy-one by Utagawa Toyokuni I.Part of the Gerhard Pulverer Collection currently housed at the Smithsonian's Freer Gallery.
He is known to have been a member of the Fuji-kō, an Edo period cult centred around Mount Fuji.Honolulu Museum Founded by an ascetic named Hasegawa Kakugyō (1541–1646),Melton 2008, 231 the cult venerated the mountain as a female deity, and encouraged its members to climb it.Yamaguchi In doing so they would be reborn, "purified and... able to find happiness."Yamaguchi The cult waned in the Meiji period and although it persists to this day it has been subsumed into Shintō sects.Melton 2008, 231 The publisher's association with the Fuji-kō gives clues not only to imagery in his portrait by Utagawa, but also to his eagerness to participate in the production of Hokusai's various works celebrating Mount Fuji.
See also Ukiyo-e Edo period
References
Sources
Machotka, Ewa. Visual Genesis of Japanese National Identity: Hokusai's Hyakunin Isshu. Brussels: Peter Lang, 2009. Marks, Andreas. Japanese Woodblock Prints: Artists, Publishers and Masterworks 1680-1900. Tokyo: Tuttle, 2010. Melton, J. Gordon. Encyclopedia of Religious Phenomena. Canton, MI: Visible Ink Press, 2008 Newland, Amy Reigle. Ed. Hotei Encyclopedia of Woodblock Prints, vol. 2., 2003. Volker, T. Ukiyoe Quartet: publisher, designer, engraver and printer. Mededelingen van het Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, Issue 5, Volume 129. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1949. Japanese Prints. Cowell-Thackray Collection of Japanese woodblock prints and works on paper. Accessed October 27, 2013. Honolulu Museum of Art. Portrait of Publisher Nishimuraya Yohachi I on His Seventy-first Birthday. Accessed October 28, 2013. __NOTOC__