“I heard the warning: /‘Here is the tigers’ kingdom”—Yosano Tekkan
For over one thousand years, the image of the tiger spread from Buddhist temple carvings to other artistic forms across China and Korea. The tiger became a favorite subject for Japanese painters at the beginning of the seventeenth century. Beginning with artists of the Kano and Rimpa schools and making an appearance in the art of notable painters like Katsu Gyokushu, Matsui Genchu, Kishi Ganku, and Maruyama Okyo, depictions of the tiger roamed freely through scrolls and screens for centuries. And as the creation of woodblock prints known as nishiki-e grew in popularity in the late Edo period, tigers began to stalk through the internationally respected designs of masters like Hokusai, Kuniyoshi, Kunisada, Yoshitoshi, and Kyosai.
In Tiger, Candice Black brings together one hundred classic representations of this extraordinary predator from across the arts, including depictions from prints, screens, scrolls, woodblocks, and lithographs. With images dating from the late sixteenth century to 1901, this gorgeous production faithfully documents the work of dozens of prominent and lesser known Japanese artists and presents the most comprehensive visual anthology of this majestic beast ever available to an English language audience.