Women Playing Music 19th century

This print, *Women Playing Music*, was made by Yanagawa Shigenobu in early 19th century Japan. It’s a woodblock print, made using a painstaking process. Imagine the labor involved: first the artist creates a drawing, and then a specialist carver meticulously etches the design into cherry wood blocks. Each color needs a separate block. Paper is then laid on the block, and rubbed to transfer the image. This is a highly skilled craft, but it is also industrialized; prints like this were made in large numbers for a ready market. You can see the influence of the method in the final result; the flat planes of color, the strong outlines, and the delicate textures, all dictated by the capabilities of the medium. The print captures a scene of women engaged in artistic pursuits, but the print itself is of course an artwork, and an example of craft that was also an industry. This is the complex reality of art in the modern world.