The Artist:      Hishikawa Sori (aka Sori III, fl. 1798 - c.1840) remains somewhat a mystery, neither his birthplace nor family name being recorded.  He did live at Bakuro-machi in Edo where many famous artists lived at one time or another.  He adopted many names, but is best known as Sori, a name he gave himself in 1798.  An early pupil of Hokusai (see below), his brushwork closely resembles that of his teacher, especially Hokusai's style of the mid-1780s.  Sori produced designs for commercially printed woodblock prints but also worked on surimono, such as book illustrations, picture calendars and privately ordered prints. 1

The Work:      From the same or a similar work of 1802, Thirty-six Craftsmen (Shokunin Sanj rokuban), is also the surimono Carpenter (Daiku).  The series was later issued as an illustrated book.  This 14 x 18.4 or 19.2 cm piece has verses by two poets.   A young woman holds up a newly made tray-table at center.  The craftsman, perhaps a shrine carpenter, looks on from the right.  Behind him are a few of his tools, and behind these is a bare plum tree with a medium-sized trunk and three branches, growing in a fairly tall cylindrical pot with a wide thin lip. 2

The Work:      Empress Komyo ( Komyo Go ) is from the 1813 series of Three Historical Beauties.  The Empress, wife of Emperor Shomun (r. AD 701-706), is depicted as an attractive courtesan in the artist's time.  She has just finished her first bath of the New Year and is cooling off in a gentle spring breeze out on the veranda ( engawa ).  To the left in a medium-sized deep round pot is a stone-clinging medium-sized hachi-no-ki with silvery round berries or leaves and a thin trunk.  The pot is white with bluish-gray characters and a forest scene on it.  To the immediate front and right of it is a deep bowl/cup bearing a companion plant.  This smaller container has horizontal bluish-gray lines or rings.  Could this work have been inspired by the Chinese Southern Song Peeping at the Bath, which concerns the consort of the Tang Emperor who happened to reign just after the Japanese Emperor Shomun? 

The Artist:      Ryuryukyo Shinsai (1764 ? - 1830, fl. c.1800-1830) was also a student of Hokusai, and later became master of his own school.  He published and illustrated large numbers of kyoka books and contributed to many other illustrated books.  His landscape prints often showed influence from Europe in their Western-style perspective and shading.  Specializing in surimono, however, he would be recognized as an innovator in still-life compositions. 3

The Work:      From 1822 is a print Bundles of Iron and Copper Ingots With a Potted Sago Palm, Plum, and Adonis Plant.  The last two – the most popular flowers of the New Year -- are front left in a small rectangular tray, which has long feet and is decorated with geometric patterns in gold or copper, red and dark gray.  The three-trunked or plant sago is in a squat grayish container with scalloped lip.  This pot rests on a flat thin red board.  There are eight stake-like iron ingots in a double-tied bundle towards the back; the three flattish square copper ingots in front are tied up with a rope “present-style” (across all four edges).
     The term for sago ( sotetsu ) is related to that of iron ( tetsu ), and the former's container is decorated with a clematis motif, a flower whose name once was written with the characters for "iron wire."  Thus there is at least one visual and verbal pun to be found in this 21.8 x 19.0 cm surimono with verses by three poets.  Of the buttercup family, adonis is a symbol of spring. 

The Artist:      Ryuryukyo Shinsai  4

The Work:      Tea Whisk, Tea Scoop, and Miniature Plum Tree, a shikishiban (approx. 21 x 18.6 cm) from c.early 1820s, is part of Keisai Eisen's Famous Places and Products of Yamashiro Province ( Yamashiro meisho meibutsu ) series.  Two poems complement the graphic of the front to back arrangement of the title objects.  The short but thick-trunked plum in near-full bloom resides in a squat container whose opening is narrower than the pot is wide.  A mountain landscape scene decorates the outside of the pot.

The Artist:      Keisai Eisen (b. Ikeda Yoshinobu, 1790-1848) was born into a samurai family and became a student of the kabuki playwright Namiki Gohei II (1768-1819).  Eisen studied the Kanō school under Hakkeisai and then the Tosa school.  Eisen briefly operated a brothel in Nezu under an assumed name before studying ukiyo-e under the printmaker Kikugawa Eizan who specialized in beautiful woman prints.  Eisen specialized in that area also, although his more realistic and lively protraits later rivaled his contemporary Kunisada.  In his later beauty prints he also applied Western techniques.  Most of Eisen's prints were in series and published by over than 50 publishers.  He also designed a small number of actor prints, some surimono, and did some collaboration with Hiroshige (see below).  With almost 400 titles, Eisen was amongst the most prolific book illustrators and he also wrote his own version of the encyclopedic history of ukiyo-e.  All told, he was a somewhat erratic, uneven, and prolific Edo artist who had only a few minor students. 5

The Work:      A Dwarf Plum, Adonis Plant, Inkstone and Envelope,1825, (21.0 x 18.1 cm) is a surimono which has eleven lines of calligraphy in its upper half.  The lower right corner shows a plum planted on the right side of a round cream-colored pot.  The Adonis is on the left.  The blue-and-white porcelain container displays a now faded to green-gray scene on its front, shows three small round feet, and has a brown thin lip which is the same width as the pot is below its indented neck.

The Artist:      Keisai Eisen 6 

The Work:      From the late 1820s comes Women Sewing and Ironing.  Verses by five poets comment on the graphic of this 21.3 x 18.8 cm surimono.  To the right behind the two women is a large deep upside-down bell-shaped pot, decorated with some repeating geometrical patterns and resting on a square of some material, a board perhaps.  In the pot is what appears to be a typically spindly plum bonsai in blossom. 

The Artist:      Keisai Eisen 7

The Work:      Chushingura (probably a standard woodblock print) represents a scene from the same titled play written in 1748 about the 1701 incident involving the 47 Ronin (masterless samurai).  A pine bonsai is left of center in a deep, upside-down bell-shaped geometric pattern decorated pot.  The medium-sized tree shows very good rootage, curving trunk and branches – and the end of the right most branch lies on the engawa upon which the pot rests.  The samurai sitting to the right and behind raises his short dagger to deliver another nonartistic cutting blow to the bonsai (oh, shades of To Boldly Grow !).  To the right a second person (with his forehead more shaved) sits in the opening of the building just off the engawa, his hands palm up in what to us would be a meditative pose even though he is watching this carnage (“vegage”?).

The Subject:   This particular print is one in a set of eleven the artist created based on the play, one print for each act.  This play is the most famous of over 100 plays written on the historical event, the most popular piece in the Kabuki theatre. 
     “In 1701 an incident occurred in the city of Edo (Tokyo) which was to have a great impact on Japanese art and culture.  On the third of January, two young daimyos, Lord Asano of Ako and Lord Date of Yoshida, were assigned by the Shogunate to receive an imperial mission from Kyoto.  Both men were young and inexperienced in the ways of court ceremony.  Lord Kira Kozukenosuke, a high court official was accordingly appointed to teach them the proper procedures.  Lord Kira expected costly gifts for his service, but Lord Asano stubbornly refused to bribe the old scoundrel.  Both men were thus insulted and ridiculed.  At one point during the instruction Lord Asano was so enraged by Lord Kira’s insults that he drew his sword and attempted to kill him.  Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, the shogun, was so angered by this breach of court etiquette that he ordered the young lord to commit seppuku (suicide) that same day.  Further punishment included the confiscation of his home, his property, and the dissolution of his small army of 300 samurai.  Without a master, the samurai disbanded and became payless ronin.  However, 47 of them impelled by the samurai spirit, banded together to avenge their master’s death.  Led by Lord Asano’s chief councilor, Oishi Kuranosuke, after two years of planning and untold hardships, they succeeded in killing Lord Kira and placing his severed head on their master’s grave.  For this crime they were sentenced to commit hara-kiri and they were all buried beside their lord in the Sengaky-ji temple near Tokyo.  The loyalty shown by these 47 ronin has inspired writers, artists and dramatists ever since to retell the moving story.”
     “[In the act depicted in this print] in act II we see Lord Wakasanosuke (the stage name for Lord Date) telling his chief councilor Honzo of the treatment he received from Moronao (Lord Kira) on that ill-fated day at the palace.  He says, ‘Tomorrow I will not bear it any longer.  I will display my mettle as a samurai by putting him to shame before His Excellency, and then cutting him down.  If I can kill this one man, Moronao, it will benefit the nation.’  Honzo listens respectfully, but he is dismayed by what he hears.  He is aware of the consequences of such a rash act, but he praises his master’s determination.  Then Honzo gets up, walks out on the engawa, and he is moved by the beautiful garden around him.  He sees at his feet the pine bonsai, the traditional symbol of longevity.  Suddenly he bends down, slashes through the beautiful kuromatsu with his dagger, and presents the branch to his master saying, ‘My lord, act decisively as I have done.’
     “However, this is only a deception.  As soon as his master retires, he gathers together all silver and silk in the household.  He surreptitiously mounts his horse and gallops off in the middle of the night to Moronao's mansion.  With these gifts he hopes to bribe Moronao and gain favor for his lord…"
      The Tokugawas exercised censorship towards the play of the "Forty-seven Ronins," because its main argument and many of its scenes reflected too clearly the corrupt practices of the Shogun's court.  Even its name was changed, and, until the Meiji Restoration, it was presented as the Chushingura (Loyal League), and the scenes strayed far from historic fact.

The Artist:      Keisai Eisen.  8

The Work:      Watering a bonsai, 18 x 12.5 cm (7-1/16 x 4-15/16 in.) a polychrome surimono shows a seated gentleman, wearing an elaborate dragon-emblazoned kimono, in the process of watering a perhaps foot-tall tree which is planted in a small but deep blue and white porcelain bowl.  The mostly white-blossomed tree has a light-colored curving trunk which arises out of possibly a root-over-rock planting that fills up the central third of the pot.  Some form of green groundcover also is present around the roots, lying below the lip of the pot.  The watering can looks more like an old metal tea pot than the traditional vessel we usually see.

The Artist:      Keisai Eisen 9 

The Work:      The Talisman ( Mayoke ) was issued in 1822.  In that year of the horse, Hokusai designed a series of elegant surimono still-life compositions relating very obliquely to the general theme of horses.  The series of which this 20.1 x 17.6 cm print is part is titled A Set of Horses ( Uma-zukushi ).
     Following the Chinese custom of enumerating sites, the "Eight Views" of Lake Biwa, near Kyoto, were a subject for classical ink-paintings.  Hokusai has hidden references to these famous views throughout the design of Mayoke.  Mii Temple, Ishiyama Temple and Mount Hira are painted on the porcelain plant pot.  The Ukimido "Floating" Temple at Katada and the Long Bridge of Seta decorate the lacquer pitcher and basin.  Awazu Castle and the returning boats at Yabase are on the towel -- which itself represents the sail of one of the boats.  Finally, the miniature pine tree – with three somewhat distinct foliage layers made up of small balls of needles -- stands in place of the ancient pine at Karasaki. 

The Artist:      Katsushika Hokusai (b. Nakajima Tamekazu, 1760-1849) was originally trained as an engraver.  He would produce perhaps 30,000 prints, sketches (15 volumes between 1814 and 1878), paintings, and book illustrations in his lifetime for over thirty different publishers.  The leading Ukiyo-e artist of the later Edo period, he had the longest career of any of the artists -- more than seventy years -- and during this time changed his style many times, making unique contributions in all fields.  He became most famous in his Western-style prints and landscapes, a genre that he significantly influenced.  He had many pupils and was always inventive, fascinating, dexterous, and daring.  This great Edo master's most famous print in the West is the often-seen In the Hollow of the Wave off the coast of Kanagawa (from the series "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji"), which exquisitely freezes the motion of a large breaking wave. 10

The Work:      Also from the above same series is Colts of the Shogi Board ( Shogi komi ) (21.2 x 18.6 cm, with three verses by two poets).  A rather nondescript thin needle of a miniature plum tree in bloom shares a blue-and-white squat, somewhat upside-down bell shaped porcelain pot with a larger adonis plant.  The container rests on a black lacquered game board. 

The Artist:      Katsushika Hokusai. 11

The Work:      From 1823 comes A Woman in the Pose of Ebisu.  This is part of the Seven Women as the Gods of Good Fortune for the Hanagasa Poetry Club ( Hanagasa-ren Shichi Fukujin ) parody series.  Ebisu was the god of wealth and the patron saint of merchants, and the print's surrounding green border is composed of auspicious symbols associated with the gods.  A potted plum tree, in bloom and with a thin double trunk, is at the far left of the 20.5 x 18.4 cm design in a round pot which is placed on the engawa and has a wide thin lip.  Three of the four poets' pieces refer to plum blossoms. 

The Artist:      Katsukawa Shuntei (b. Yamaguchi Chojuro, 1770-1824) produced numerous book illustrations in addition to surimono, and prints of beauties, sumo wrestlers, and actors.  He eventually became the forerunner for a new style of warrior print: illustrating entire battle scenes across all three sheets of an ōban-sized triptych, a style which influenced future artists like Kuniyoshi.  In 1804 he was one of the artists who were manicled for fifty days for illustrating a politically dangerous figuree in his prints.  Later, he would experiment with Western-style landscapes. 12

The Work:      Women of the Genroku Period Admiring a Pot of Adonis Flowers.  Dated Spring, Dragon Year (1820), this 20.3 x 17.6 cm surimono has a medium-sized bowl with a wide lip to the left of the title figures.  Its bonsai appears to be a plum with a fair-sized trunk cut low and sprouting at least seven thin vertical branches of assorted height.  The verse above left and center is by Enjudo.

The Artist:     Tosaian Namboku (fl. 1820) 13

The Work:      Still Life (1831) has verses by four poets covering the upper third of this 20.5 x 18.5 cm surimono portrayal of an inkstone and slab, hand scroll, miniature plum, and silver rabbit.  (The picture was published in a Rabbit Year.)  On three paw-like feet, the squat Chinese-style decorated container is encircled by a number of emblems, each with a  character.  The tree seems to be older and is better developed than previous ones we've seen:  the branches show good taper, are more curved and horizontal.  A couple of adonis appear to be also planted in the pot. 

The Artist:      Katsushika Taito II (fl. mid-1810s - c. 1850) was a pupil of Hokusai and worked in both Edo and Osaka.  He frequently forged his master’s signature. 14

The Work:      Husband and Wife ( Fufu ) (early 1830s) of the Three Bonds for the Asahi Circle ( Asahiren sanko no uchi ) series.  Three Takeshima poets are represented on this 20.2 x 17.5 cm surimono of our old friends: Sano Genzaemon Tsuneyo to the right, his wife Anjuhime [sic] to the left/center, and their three miniature trees (see Hachi-No-Ki ).  The pine is front/center, one of the others is along the right edge next to the samurai, and the third tree is barely visible in the center behind him.  The couple is shown younger than the story tells and Tsuneyo is dressed in quality samurai garb.

The Artist:      Apparently also Katsushika Taito. 15

The Artist:      Ando Hiroshige (aka Ichiyusai, 1797-1858), the son of an Edo fire warden, began studying at age fourteen ukiyo-e under Utagawa Toyohiro (1774-1829, a storybook illustrator who was a less successful competitor of Toyokuni, who it is said rejected Hiroshige as a student).  Hiroshige later adopted techniques from the Kanō, Maruyama and Shijo schools, as well as the Chinese Southern style and even Western style of painting.  He moved beyond the endless re-runs of actors and courtesans into the boundless natural world around us.  From these diverse elements he developed a distinct style of his own.  He had an enormous production of single sheets, prints in series, illustrations for more than 130 books, some 500 fan designs, sketches, and 200 paintings -- over eight thousand known items during a forty-year career.  Delightful, charming, and dexterous, he was an artist of Japanese life and topography.  The prints and sketches show great technical virtuosity and a naturalistic viewpoint, although his paintings are rather dull and less interesting.  During the 1840s, landscape prints, nearly all of them designed by Hiroshige, were published in large numbers, and more intense colors began to be used.  His masterworks include "Tōkaidō," "One Hundred Famous Views of Edo," and "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji." 16

The Work:      Edo Meisho Zue ( Painting of Famous Places in Edo ) from 1836 includes illustrations of merchants selling bonsai at a street market near a temple.

The Artist:      Ando Hiroshige 17

The Work:      Chushingura ( Loyal subject warehouse [ of stories about the 47 Ronin ], see above), Act 4 "Envoys from the Shogun Approach Lady Kaoyo and Group at Enya's Castle, Bringing Sentence of Death to Enya, Lady Kaoyo Is Surrounded by Cherry Blossoms Gathered to Cheer Enya during His Incarceration," Senichi issue, 1836, oban shows what appears at first glance to be a large potted tree on the engawa, with two smaller ones at the base of the steps in front of this porch, just right of bottom center of this standard woodblock print.  Of the latter plants, a light-colored well-foliaged tree is on the right, exposed root or root over rock style in a cylindrical container with wide feet around its base and a white and light checkerboard design below its wide thin lip.  To the left and slightly behind in what might be a lipped hexagonal pot with a peg foot at the base of each facet is a well-developed slightly weeping plum (perhaps) with dark secondary branches and foliage and some thirty oval fruits (persimmons?). 
     The large “potted tree” is seems to be a bushy deciduous in a container having vertical loop handles and a thin wide lip which sweeps out of a narrow neck above the dark globular basket.  This rests on a low wide dark table of perhaps polished wood, the center of attention.  One description of this feature is “a large bowl of rare cherry-blossoms.”  The woman resting on her knees to the left of this does have a single full branch of the same type of plant cradled in her right arm, her left hand extending into the main foliage.  The narrow neck of the herring-bone patterned basket and the multiple thin stems would seem to authenticate this composition as an ikebana rather than a bonsai, but the triangular shape of the lush foliage is a magnet for one’s eye nontheless. 

The Artist:      Ando Hiroshige 18

The Work:      "Landscape portraits of Japan... all speak to the panoramic character of Hiroshige's vision.  This is why the intimacy of this scene which captures a beautiful woman in the act of removing leaves which have collected in the basin at left is so remarkable coming from the hand of Hiroshige.  One presumes her intent is to water the 'Root over Rock' style pine bonsai at right."

The Artist:      Ando Hiroshige 19

The Work:      The Story of the Potted Trees (c.1843-1847), a triptych standard print.  This is the most dramatic of the versions our researches have thus far uncovered. 

The Artist:      Utagawa Kuniyoshi (b. Igusa Kuniyoshi, 1798-1861), son of a silk dryer, was a pupil of Toyokuni and studied the Tosa, Kanō, and Maruyama schools before founding his own style.  First attempting actor prints, he became particularly noted for his warrior prints throughout his career and was even asked to tatoo his paintings on the bodies of young men who liked the style of his artwork.  Kuniyoshi continued to produce a constant flow of innovative creations, fortifying his position as the leading designer of warriors.  He did fine Western-style landscape prints during the 1830s and early 1840s as well as large numbers of beautiful women, actors, comical prints, erotica, board games, illustrations for over 240 books, and nearly 250 series for well over 150 publishers. 20

The Work:      Amerika no shōnin shōju no sakura o motomete ōini kanki no zu (American merchant exceedingly delighted with long awaited cherry blossoms of a miniature tree) (1861), an ōban publised by Moriya Jihei, this print which shows a man admiring a bonsai tree in bloom, it possibly reminds him of his wife and brings to mind her portrait hanging in the upper left corner.  (Jihei published significantly between 1797 and 1861.  He was engaged by Utamaro, Kunisada, and Hokusai, among others.  The business seems to have come to an end around 1886.)

The Artist:      Sadahide Utagawa (1807-c.1878, original name: Hashimoto) was a pupil of Kunisada.  A highly talented artist with a somewhat mixed output, the majority of his early production seems to have been warrior prints, which follow in the style of Kuniyoshi, though he also made some bijin-ga in the style of his teacher Kunisada.  Best appreciated and noted are his Yokohama-e prints from the Western enclave of Yokohama depicting map-like scenes with Westerners.  At his time he was obviously among the top appreciated designers, as his works were displayed with eleven other artists in the World Exposition Universelle in Paris in 1867 at the Japanese pavillion.  The following year he was listed as the top ranking print artist.  After the Meiji Restoration, Sadahide produced some of the best Yokohama-e available, and introduced some new pictorial styles that broadened the scope of ukiyo-e.  These include his multi-sheet maps/views of Yokohama and Edo from the air, and triptychs in which figures were not confined to a single sheet, but swelled in closeup over all three.

There also is a picture book by Sadahide produced shortly before the Meiji Restoration which has the most scathing satire of the loss of martial values among the samurai.  Images include frail and aged warriors, sagging and effeminate warriors, and warriors wearing so much armor they cannot be seen beneath.  An interesting political stance from a warrior print master on the state of Japan at the time. 23

The Work:      Picture of a Foreign Building in Yokohama (Yokohama ijinkan no zu) (December 1861), a 34.9 x 73.4 cm (13-11/16 x 28-7/8 in.) oban triptych standard print which depicts the building of Walsh & Co., the first American firm to reach Yokohama in 1859, just before Dr. George R. Hall's departure for the United States.  Of particular interest is the garden in the large courtyard, where Japanese, Chinese, and Western visitors stroll.  Plants grow in an orderly plot, and a magnificent bonsai pine, or miniature potted tree, can be seen in the distance.  Hall, a pioneer resident of Yokohama, assembled an important collection of Japanese plants, which he transported to the United States in 1862.  This print suggests that his garden may have attracted visitors from Yokohama's small international community. The artist captured some of the plants that Dr. Hall was shipping to the States.  In early 1862 Frances Hall joined the firm, which then became known as Walsh, Hall & Co.
     In the middle of the right-hand panel in a very large round blue pot (perhaps equivalent to two-thirds of a meter high and a meter in diameter) is a large pine, perhaps a meter high or a little taller.  It is not known what became of this large bonsai, if it, indeed, was part of the plant shipment. 

The Artist:      Suzuki Hiroshige II (1826-1869), best pupil and adopted son of Ando Hiroshige, Suzuki Shigenobu took over the name after his teacher's death and was used by him until his retirement to Yokohama c.1865 when he changed his name to Kisai.  He illustrated roughly 20 books during his career and a number of fine paintings.  Like his teacher before him, he often worked with Kunisada and drew the landscapes or insets in their collaborative works.  One of his most popular series was "One Hundred Famous Views in the Provinces" (1859-1861).  In order to make a living in his last years he had turned to decorating lanterns, lites, and especially tea chests (chabako) for export.  Owing to their similar styles and use of similar signatures and seals, the late paintings of Hiroshige I and Hiroshige II have yet to be differentiated satisfactorily. 24

"Scene from the Hachinoki Story" in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts collection, http://tagger.steve.museum/steve/object/140917?offset=;

Smith (ed.) Ukiyo-e, pg. 28;