Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

Ashmolean − Eastern Art Online, Yousef Jameel Centre for Islamic and Asian Art

Japanese Ghosts and Demons: Ukiyo-e prints from the Ashmolean

(from 29th Sep 2010 until 27th Feb 2011)

Prepare for giant spiders, dancing skeletons, winged goblins, and hordes of ghostly warriors!

Japanese Ghosts and Demons: Ukiyo-e prints from the Ashmolean
The Earth Spider Conjures up Demons at the Mansion of Minamoto Raikōfront

© Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

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The Earth Spider Conjures up Demons at the Mansion of Minamoto Raikō

  • Description

    This print depicts the tenth-century warrior Minamoto no Yorimitsu, also known as Raikō, who was famed for his legendary skill in the martial arts. This scene shows an episode in which Raikō, seen on the far right of the triptych, has been overpowered by the evil magic of the vicious earth spider and has fallen into a dreamlike trance. His four retainers are unaware of the demons. The print was also seen as a satire on the unpopular Tenpō reforms that were carried out in the 1840s. The sleeping Raikō could be interpreted as the shogun and the ghosts as the suffering victims of the reforms.

  • Details

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    Associated place
    Asia › Japan › Honshū › Kantō › Tōkyō prefecture › Tōkyō (place of creation)
    Asia › Japan › Honshū › Kantō › Tōkyō prefecture › Tōkyō (place of publication)
    Date
    1843
    Edo Period (1600 - 1868)
    Artist/maker
    Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797 - 1861) (designer)
    Associated people
    Minamoto no Yorimitsu (AD 944 - 1021) (subject)
    Urabe no Suetake (active 11th century) (subject)
    Ibaya Senzaburō (active c. 1820s - c. 1870s) (publisher)
    Material and technique
    woodblock print, with bokashi (tonal gradation)
    Dimensions
    mount 55.5 x 33.8 cm (height x width)
    sheet 35 x 24 cm (height x width)
    Material index
    processed material › paper
    Technique index
    printed › relief print › woodcut › colour woodcut
    Object type index
    visual representation › print › triptych print
    No. of items
    1
    Credit line
    Presented by George Grigs, Miss Elizabeth Grigs, and Miss Susan Messer, in memory of Derick Grigs, 1971.
    Accession no.
    EA1971.164.a

  • Further reading

    Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 23 April-22 September 2013, Manjū: Netsuke from the Collection of the Ashmolean Museum, Joyce Seaman, ed. (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2013), illus. p. 186 fig. 54

Past Exhibition

see (1)

Location

    • currently in research collection

Objects are sometimes moved to a different location. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis. Contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular object on display, or would like to arrange an appointment to see an object in our reserve collections.

 

Notice

Objects from past exhibitions may have now returned to our stores or a lender. Click into an individual object record to confirm whether or not an object is currently on display. Our object location data is usually updated on a monthly basis, so please contact the Jameel Study Centre if you are planning to visit the museum to see a particular Eastern Art object.

© 2013 University of Oxford - Ashmolean Museum