YOSHITOSHI Tsukioka (1839-92)Yoshitoshi Tsukioka (–F”NŒŽ‰ª) was a pupil of Utagawa Kuniyoshi. Often characterized as the last great master of the ukiyo-e print, Yoshitoshi's images ranged from the agitated and violent to the silent and tranquil. Among his special skills was the ability to revitalize the legends, histories, traditions, and customs of Japan's recent and distant past. Yoshitoshi's final series of prints was his Shinkei sanjûrokkaisen ("New Forms of Thirty-six Ghosts"), first published by Sasaki Toyokichi between April 1889 and July 1892. As Yoshitoshi became ill and would die before the last three designs of the set were published, he might have been assisted near the end by his students Toshikata (1866-1908) and Toshihide (1863-1925), but the extent of their involvement is unknown. Except for at least one design (see Oniwakamaru below), the title cartouches in the prints from the first edition have three colors, distinguishing them from later impressions bearing only two colors in the cartouches. Even early impressions differ in the particular three colors chosen for the cartouches; for example, the pink-blue-yellow scheme in the figure on the left was changed to pink-blue-violet in some printings. A similar situation exists for later editions — impressions are known in both pink-yellow and pink-green cartouche printings. All the prints have black cartouches with the series title left unprinted in white reserve (possibly suggestive of funerary script). The rough edges of the borders represent an artistic convention for antique, insect-eaten paper edges. Early and Later Editions ("Original")
The images above illustrate what is probably the most poignant design from the series, Sarayashiki Okiku no rei ("The Ghost of Okiku at the Dish Mansion"), engraved by Chokusan and first published in the eighth month of 1890. The tale is one of the best known of all Japanese ghost stories, but it varies in the details depending on the source of the story. In one version Okiku was a maid in the service of Aoyama Tessan, a high-ranking retainer of the child shogun Tokugawa Ietsugu (1709-16). When his wife breaks one of ten valuable Delft porcelain dishes entrusted to the family for safekeeping by Dutch merchants, she throws the pieces into a well to hide her guilt and accuses Okiku, who in her shame drowns herself in the well. Thereafter her ghost counts aloud from one to nine, then lets out a terrible wail. Ultimately, a family friend is enlisted to help, and one night, just as the Ghost reaches "nine," he loudly says "ten," and the ghost never returns to the well. An alternate version based on the kabuki play Bancho Sarayashiki ("The Dish Mansion at Bancho") has Aoymama trying to seduce Okiku by stealing one of the dishes and threatening her with blame unless she acquiesces. She drowns herself and haunts the well as in the earlier version. Yoshitoshi's portrayal of Okiku is unusually sympathetic, particularly as ghosts were viewed as fearsome apparitions by nineteenth-century Japanese. The quality of the printing in the image at the top left is superb, executed with subtle gradations and shadings to depict the translucent form of a ghost. Note especially the lower part of Okiku's figure, which fades into nothingness. She has no feet (a characteristic of all ghosts), and the well can be seen through her ethereal aspect. The impression in the figure above right illustrates the loss of subtlety that is so often the case with later printings of ukiyo-e designs. The shading is cruder and darker, as well as more uniform and less gradated, which gives Okiku's form more substance and contradicts Yoshitoshi's intention to effectively depict Okiku's translucent ghost.
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