Japanese_art_design

09/12/2026

The moon gets its own season in Japan. 🌕

Snow, moon, flowers — setsugekka: the three subjects every Japanese artist was expected to master. Snow carries winter, flowers carry spring, and the moon carries autumn — in Japan, moon-viewing (tsukimi) is an autumn ritual, not a summer one.

The part I love is how they were made: in ukiyo-e printmaking, snow and moonlight were often printed from nothing at all. The paper was left bare and the sky was built around it with bokashi — a graded wash hand-wiped onto the woodblock.

September is when the harvest moon comes.

09/11/2026

Van Gogh copied his prints — twice. 🗻

Hiroshige was a fire warden in Edo with quiet hours on his hands, and he used them to paint an entire city. One Hundred Famous Views of Edo: 118 sheets, made over the last decade of his life.

He died in 1858 with a brush in his hand, and left this poem:

”I leave my brush in the East
and set forth to see
the famous places of the Western Paradise.”

The full story is in the carousel on my page.

09/04/2026

09/03/2026

More art that comes alive?

08/28/2026

Before influencers, there were bijin. 🎎

The beautiful women of Edo — celebrities printed by the thousand, setting fashion trends from the pleasure quarters to every household. Swipe for the story of bijin-ga. 👉

Which theme next? Dragons / Birds & flowers / The artists — vote in the comments 👇

Get 20% off your first print with code Welcome20ForYou — link in bio.

08/24/2026

The carp that refused to give up. 🐟

In Japanese legend, a koi that swims up the waterfall becomes a dragon. A little perseverance for your wall !

20% off your first print: Welcome20ForYou. Link in bio.

08/24/2026

Dare eat me? ⚡

The Thunder God keeps watch while you eat this roll. Hokusai’s menacing deity, hanging where the sushi flows.

Get 20% off your first print with code Welcome20ForYou. Link in bio.