About This Print
JAPANESE VOCATION IN PICTURES19FLAG MERCHANTSSince the beginning of hostilities in china [sic], a fixed form has been evolved for the seeing off of soldiers going to the front and consrripted [sic] men going into barracks. In celebration of a man's entering the army or leaving for the front, a great streamer flanked by lesser banners is set up in front of his house.
The flag merchants who have gone into activity with this development may be called specialists. They work intently away in gloomy breezeless closed rooms of four-and-a-half or six mats with ceilings, doors and walls crowded with everything from sunrise flags, championship banners and posters of congratulation on the opening of new shop to stage curtains for story tellers' halls.
These merchants are all cheerful with supplies enough to give them prosperity. Innocent of all artistic training in their tiny rooms they swing immense brushes magnificently without the least thought of spacing or any blocking in of the characters they so speedily produce. And what's more, with cigarette in teeth, they do it all with perfect ease.
A Critical View
Source: Light in Darkness: Women in Japanese Prints of Early Shōwa (1926-1945), Kendall H. Brown, et. al., Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California, 1996, p. 20.
In the introduction to the catalog of the exhibition Light in Darkness: Women in Japanese Prints of Early Shōwa (1926-1945), Dr. Kendall H. Brown states:
Wada Sanzō’s collaborative efforts with the government lay not only in his activities with the Japan Artists Patriotic Association, but also in his artwork. From his ca. 1940 Series Occupations of Showa Japan in Pictures: Flag Merchants (cat. 16) expresses an obviously nationalistic theme. When a soldier went off to war, people in his native village or neighborhood would see the young man off with a salute of flags and cheers. Patriotic celebrations at schools and businesses also demanded flats and banners. Thus after 1937 the flag shop became a common addition to Japanese towns.
About the Series "Occupations of the Shōwa Era in Pictures"
Sources: website of Ross Walker Ohmi Gallery http://www.ohmigallery.com/DB/Artists/Sales/Wada_Sanzo.asp and website of USC Pacific Asian Museum "Exhibition - The Occupations of Shōwa Japan in Pictures: The Woodblock Prints of Wada Sanzō"
Note:
My special thanks to Shinagawa Daiwa, the current owner of Kyoto Hangain, for providing the below information (in a series of emails in July 2014) about Nishinomiya Shoin and Kyoto Hangain, both businesses started by his father Shinagawa Kyoomi. Shinagawa's current website can be accessed at http://www.amy.hi-ho.ne.jp/kyotohangain/
2 "Out of the Dark Valley: Japanese Woodblock Prints and War, 1937-1945," Kendall H. Brown,p. 82 appearing in Impressions, The Journal of the Ukiyo-e Society of America, Inc., Number 23, 2001.
3 Pacific Asia Museum website http://www.pacificasiamuseum.org/_on_view/exhibitions/2004/occshowa.aspx
4 Light in Darkness: Women in Japanese Prints of Early Shōwa (1926-1945), Kendall H. Brown, et. al., Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California, 1996, p. 18.
IHL Catalog | #1021 |
Title/Description | 旗屋 [hataya] - Flag Merchants [number 19] |
Series | Occupations of Shōwa Japan in Pictures, Series 1 (also seen translated as "Compendium of Occupations in the Shōwa Era" and "Japanese Vocations in Pictures") Shōwa shokugyō e-zukushi 昭和職業繪盡 (also seen written as 昭和職業絵尽し and 昭和職業繪盡し), daiishū (第一輯) |
Artist |
Wada Sanzō (1883-1967) |
Signature |
三造 Sanzō |
Seal | ![]() |
Publication Date | May 1940 |
Publisher | ![]() |
Edition | a pre-War edition, and likely a first edition |
Impression | excellent |
Colors | excellent |
Condition | good - light overall toning; slight tear and thinning upper right corner caused by removal from original folio. |
Genre | shin hanga |
Miscellaneous | originally released by Nishinomiya Shoin as print number 19 in series 1 |
Format | dai-oban |
H x W Paper | 11 1/2 x 15 1/8 in. (29.2 x 38.4 cm) |
H x W Image | 10 3/4 x 14 3/8 in. (27.3 x 36.5 cm) |
Collections This Print | Himeji City Museum of Art Ⅲ-183-19 (dated "1939~1940年"); British Museum 2003,0816,0.3 |
Reference Literature | Light in Darkness: Women in Japanese Prints of Early Shōwa (1926-1945), Kendall H. Brown, et. al., Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California, 1996, p. 19-20, cat. 16. |