Samurai fighting, Satsuma rebellion

Tsukioka Yoshitoshi’s (1839-1892) career spanned the late Edo and early Meiji periods. He trained in the ie ‘studio’ of Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1798-1861). His early works gave late Utagawa school theatricality an even greater sense of energy. A taste for lurid melodrama became progressively grotesque as he experienced periods of depression and hospitalisation that interrupted his professional activities. Two events provided opportunities for his professional revival. The first was the opportunity to design "overtly anti-foreign" patriotic reportage illustrations for newspaper and journal inserts in publications like Yamato Shinbun. The second was the Satsuma Rebellion of 1877, much celebrated in the film <em>The Last Samurai</em>, which ended in their tragic defeat.

This, however, heralded a positive future for Yoshitoshi. The public were eager for news of rebellion events, and Yoshitoshi’s colour newspaper illustrations were an immediate hit. He published at least thirteen sets of colour print triptych inserts for these publications; between two and 23 compositions survive from each series. Series titles like Sasshu Kagoshima seito ki no uchi (A Chronicle of the Subjugation of Kagoshima in Sasshu [Satsuma]) emphasise the patriotic tenor of Yoshitoshi’s representations of events. Their common theme is the defeat of a shambolic samurai assembly by superior, smartly dressed and impeccably organised Imperial forces.

The force of the conflict, and the clash of conservative samurai values and Western conventions even in distant Satsuma are evident in Yoshitoshi’s representation of an early encounter in Kagoshima in this vivid triptych. The aggressive flood of samurai is in striking contrast to the distinctive Western style doors, windows, chandelier, furniture, and even the bowler hats strewn amongst the protagonists. Yoshitoshi’s Utagawa heritage clearly informs this dynamic depiction of the urgency and violence of events in Satsuma. Ironically, while Yoshitoshi’s Satsuma Rebellion illustrations lionised the superiority of the modern Imperial military force over the samurai community, his final projects celebrated the military history, national heroes, and folk lore of pre-Meiji Japan.

Source: David Bell, 'A new vision: modern Japanese prints from the Heriot collection', <em>Tuhinga</em> 31 (forthcoming; due 2020).

Dr Mark Stocker    Curator, Historical International Art   May 2019