This is a beautiful survey of some of the most famous hot springs (onsen) in Japan during the 1940s and 50s, and one of the largest Sosaku Hanga volumes published in Japan.
It includes Nikko Yumoto, Tohi, Beppu (vol. 1), Unzen, Ibusuki, Aizu Yu-no-kami (vol. 2), Wakura, Yuwaku, Kinosaki (vol. 3), Noboribetsu, Yu-no-kawa, Naruko (vol. 4), Onneyu, Itamuro, Yuzenji, and Atami (vol. 5) - to name just a few. Maekawa must have had a great time travelling to all of these places. He perfectly captures the rustic and relaxed atmosphere of these institutions which are often embedded in some of the most scenic locations of Japan.
Maekawa Senpan (1888-1960) was an unusual figure working both as a cartoonist as well as a printmaker. Born in Kyoto he studied Western style painting at the Kansai Bijutsuin. He moved to Tokyo in 1911 and started to work as a caricaturist for Tokyo Puck and the Yomiuri Shimbun.
He had a strong interest in the arts and crafts movement and taught himself woodblock printing. At that time the sosaku hanga movement dominated the scene which advocated that prints should be ‘self-drawn’, ‘self-carved’ and ‘self-printed’, and Maekawa fully embraced those tenets.
Each volume was printed in a slightly different limited edition. Interestingly the number goes down after the end of the war, but most people were still too poor to pay for books like these. The second volume printed in 1944 carries a printed note on the colophon page stating that the publication was privately printed and not for sale. In the last few years of the war paper was in short supply but somehow Maekawa managed to circumvent the severe restrictions.
Only one set in OCLC.
