How was Europe influenced by Japanese woodblock prints?
In the late 19th century, Japonism had a huge influence on European art, especially on Impressionism. Beginning in the 1860's Japanese woodblock prints became a source of inspiration for many Western artists who were intrigued by the original use of color and composition in these works.
The yōga style painters were inspired by the entire European painting history. Depending on their own preferences, Japanese painters found different inspirations. Especially the works of Dürer and 17th century Dutch landscape paintings were appreciated.
The influence of Japanese woodcuts remained evident in Van Gogh's works through his strong outlines. His use of black and color contrasts, along with cropped compositions, reflected Japanese culture and tradition. French artist Edgar Degas embraced the exotic art in a different way.
A large group of works by European and American artists of the Impressionist and Post-Impressionist eras who were influenced by the Japanese print includes prints and drawings by Mary Cassatt, Edgar Degas, Edouard Manet, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent van Gogh, and James Abbott McNeill Whistler.
Woodblock method became popular in Europe:
Production of handwritten manuscripts could not meet the ever increasing demand for books. Copying was an expensive, laborious and time consuming business. The manuscripts were fragile, awkward to handle and could not be carried around or read easily.
The Impressionists were also interested in Japanese prints. After visiting an 1890 exhibition of ukiyo-e prints in Paris, Mary Cassatt employed similar decorative patterns, flattened spaces and simplified figures in a series of color etchings that includes The Letter.
Before the 1800s, the Christian church was a major influence upon European art, the commissions of the Church, architectural, painterly and sculptural, providing the major source of work for artists. The history of the Church was very much reflected in the history of art, during this period.
The Japanese art movement called ukiyo-e, or “pictures of the floating world,” created an important link between the Western and Eastern art world. Ukiyo-e art is also the name for Japanese woodblock prints or Japonisme.
When Japanese prints arrived in the West, they exerted an immediate impact on visual arts, including the lithograph. Impressionist artists Monet and Degas bought and studied them, and Post-Impressionist artist van Gogh claimed that his own work was inspired by Japanese art.
Buddhism and, to a lesser degree, Shinto, Japan's earliest belief system, were influences on Japanese art. Buddhism came from Korea in the 6th century, leading to the construction of religious sites and sculptures that adhered to Korean and Chinese prototypes.
How did Japanese prints influence Western painting?
At the end of the 19th century, Impressionism was greatly influenced by Japanese art. Japanese prints are characterized by elaborate patterns, communal subject matter, unusual perspectives and lack of chiaroscuro or depth. Japanese artists such as Koide Narashige, Hazama Inosuke and Hayashi Shizue spent time in Paris ...
During the 1860s, Japanese art flowed into Europe as trade links were opened for the first time in 200 years. Examples of Japanese art were shown in galleries, stores and shops, and had a major impact on artists and designers in the West.

The predominance of European art styles grew with the Flemish influence in Catalonia, and finally, as Spain became unified into a Christian Kingdom, the full effects of the Renaissance and the Baroque were seen as Spain entered its Siglo de Oro (golden age) of art production.
Ukiyo-e, or "pictures of the floating world," refers to a genre of Japanese woodblock prints.
Katsushika Hokusai's Under the Wave off Kanagawa, also called The Great Wave has became one of the most famous works of art in the world—and debatably the most iconic work of Japanese art.
Woodblock print was invented around the sixth century in China. It came to Europe, along with Marco Polo, in 1295. Marco Polo returned to Italy after many years of exploration in China, and he brought the knowledge of woodblock print with him on his return.
ii In 1295 Marco polo a great explorer returned to Italy after many years of exploration in China. He brought the knowledge of wood block printing from China and the Italians began producing books with wood blocks and soon the technology spread to the other parts of Europe.
"In the 13th century the Chinese technique of blockprinting was transmitted to Europe", soon after paper became available in Europe.
Japonisme transformed Impressionist art by demonstrating that simple, transitory, everyday subjects could be presented in appealingly decorative ways.
Analytic Cubism (1909–1912)
Cubism has been considered the most influential art movement of the 20th century. Cubism had a global reach as a movement, influencing similar schools of thought in literature, music, and architecture.
Which of the following statements is true about the spread of Japanese prints to Europe?
Which of the following statements is true about the spread of Japanese prints to Europe? European artists looked to Japanese art as a source of inspiration and rejuvenation.
Overview. Historians generally recognize three motives for European exploration and colonization in the New World: God, gold, and glory.
The common literary heritage is essentially that originating in ancient Greece and Rome. It was preserved, transformed, and spread by Christianity and thus transmitted to the vernacular languages of the European Continent, the Western Hemisphere, and other regions that were settled by Europeans.
The opportunity to make money was one of the primary motivators for the colonization of the New World. The Virginia Company of London established the Jamestown colony to make a profit for its investors. Europe's period of exploration and colonization was fueled largely by necessity.
One Impressionist particularly inspired by the Japanese art entering Europe was Vincent van Gogh. Along with his brother Theo, Van Gogh amassed a huge collection of ukiyo-e prints, many of which he hung around his studio.
Widely known as the first modern art movement, Impressionism remains one of the most popular and prevalent forms of art today. While much of the groundbreaking genre was impressively original, Impressionists, like most artists, found inspiration in other forms of art—namely, in Japanese woodblock prints.
The late 19th-century artistic influence of the woodcut lay in its disavowal of Western perspective, an ingrained facility for two-dimensional patterning, and an unwavering sense of coloration.
Japanese design in general has been heavily influenced by the world around it. Japan is a country with a very diverse artisan craft tradition. Ceramics, woodcut prints, calligraphy, origami, kabuki theatre, and more recently manga and anime are just some of the arts developed there.
There was a reciprocal influence between Japan and Western Europe. Western artists were fascinated by the subject matter and techniques that Japanese printmakers used in their work. With Japanese influence, artists in Europe focused on different mediums. Printmaking in Europe allowed for art to be more accessible.
Japanese architecture was originally heavily influenced by Chinese architecture and later developed many unique aspects indigenous to Japan.
What 3 countries influenced Japanese culture?
Buddhism—which originated in India and underwent modification in Central Asia, China, and Korea before reaching Japan about the 6th century—also exerted a profound influence on Japanese cultural life, although over the course of time it was modified profoundly from its antecedent forms.
All artist's work is influenced by many different factors; from culture to politics, surroundings, family, upbringing, the list is endless. All of these and more have such an influence in most art works.
For Japan, the cultures that most influenced it were those of China and Korea. Japan is an island off the coasts of China and Korea, meaning that these two civilizations were the link connecting Japan to the rest of mainland Asia.
Although ukiyo-e practioners were considered mere artisans in Japan, they captivated European artists, who drew inspiration from the calligraphic line drawing, abstraction and simplification of natural appearances, flat color and silhouettes, unconventional use of bold black shapes and decorative patterns.
Japanese culture including fine art, food, fashion, and customs has been adopted and popularized by the Western world now for over a century. Today, Japanese culture influences our daily lives as a result of globalization and its rapid integration in the West over time.
Woodblock prints were initially used as early as the eighth century in Japan to disseminate texts, especially Buddhist scriptures. The designer and painter Tawaraya Sōtatsu (died ca. 1640) used wood stamps in the early seventeenth century to print designs on paper and silk.
Johannes Gutenberg
In Europe, the printing press did not appear until 150 years after Wang Chen's innovation. Goldsmith and inventor Johannes Gutenberg was a political exile from Mainz, Germany when he began experimenting with printing in Strasbourg, France in 1440.
During the Tang and Song dynasties, woodblock printing has helped convey pieces of information more easily as it became easier to publish and spread a variety of texts. Printing also became a form of entertainment as the image of the carved wood can be transferred onto silk or paper.
Woodblock printing allowed for the spread of information, religious texts, and news, making literacy more accessible to the general population.
Ukiyo-e art also influenced the Impressionists to focus on the subject only and to eliminate excessive details and complicated backgrounds from their paintings. It also gave the impressionists and post-impressionists an understanding of the beauty of a “flat” appearance in artwork.
Why is Japanese woodblock printing important?
Around the world, printing also became an important part of art. This was especially true in Japan, where woodblock printing came to define the national aesthetic. Woodblock printing involves the engraving of an image or words onto a block of wood, which is painted with ink and pressed against paper.
The chiaroscuro woodcut, invented in Germany by Hans Burgkmair around 1509, was created by printing a line block—which carried the contours and crosshatching, and could sometimes stand alone as a black and white woodcut—together with one or more tone blocks.
Woodblock print only came to Europe after 1295. Martin Luther was in favour of print and spoke out in praise of it. No worries!
Movable type was never widely used in China because whole-block printing was less expensive, but when movable type reached Europe in the 15th century, it revolutionized the communication of ideas.
Gutenberg's invention was brought to England in 1476 by William Caxton, an Englishman who had lived in Bruges, Belgium, for years. Caxton went to Cologne to learn to print in 1471 in order to set up a press in Bruges and publish his own translations of various works.
Printing first became mechanized in Europe during the 15th century. The earliest mention of a mechanized printing press in Europe appears in a lawsuit in Strasbourg in 1439; it reveals construction of a press for Johannes Gutenberg and his associates.
Humanism, intellectualism, classic style, and philosophy are all part of the European cultural identity associated with Renaissance art. European art produced some of the most renowned and valued artworks as well as architectural masterpieces during this time period.