Chōkōsai Eishō (, ) was a Japanese

ukiyo-e Ukiyo-e is a genre of Japanese art which flourished from the 17th through 19th centuries. Its artists produced woodblock prints and paintings of such subjects as female beauties; kabuki actors and sumo wrestlers; scenes from history and folk ...

artist. He also used the name Shōeidō (). Eishō's personal details are unknown. His works that remain show a practised skill, so it is likely that they appeared after years of apprenticeship. He is the most prominent student of Eishi and had a prolific output; nearly 200 of his works remain—more than any other student of Eishō's. He produced at least twenty print series published by fourteen publishers, in particular for Yamaguchiya Chūsuke. The majority of his work appeared between and . Eishō's work is assumed to have been in competition with that of

Utamaro Kitagawa Utamaro ( ja, 喜多川歌麿; – 31 October 1806) was a Japanese artist. He is one of the most highly regarded designers of ukiyo-e woodblock prints and paintings, and is best known for his '' bijin ōkubi-e'' "large-head ...

, who was known for his vertical ''

ōkubi-e An is a Japanese portrait print or painting in the ukiyo-e genre showing only the head or the head and upper torso. Katsukawa Shunkō I (1743–1812) is generally credited with producing the first ōkubi-e. He, along with Katsukawa Shunshō ...

'' bust prints in the ''

bijin-ga is a generic term for pictures of beautiful women () in Japanese art, especially in woodblock printing of the ukiyo-e genre. Definition defines as a picture that simply "emphasizes the beauty of women", and the ''Shincho Encyclopedia of W ...

'' genre of portraits of beautiful women. Most of Eishō's prints were in the same format. He depicted his subjects in an elegant, slender-proportioned style. His most representative prints are considered to be those from the series ''Kakuchū bijin kurabe'' (, "Contest of beauties in the pleasure quarters", ). The series depicts actual courtesans from the

Yoshiwara was a famous (red-light district) in Edo, present-day Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1617, Yoshiwara was one of three licensed and well-known red-light districts created during the early 17th century by the Tokugawa shogunate, alongside Shima ...

pleasure quarters, and the backgrounds were treated with glimmering

mica Micas ( ) are a group of silicate minerals whose outstanding physical characteristic is that individual mica crystals can easily be split into extremely thin elastic plates. This characteristic is described as perfect basal cleavage. Mica is ...

. Eishō contributed twenty of the twenty-four print designs; the remainder were by fellow Eishi students and Eiu. Eishō produced illustrations for a few books in , some of which were '' shunga'' erotica. Prints by him ceased appearing around 1801, the same year Eishi gave up print designing for '' nikuhitsu-ga'' painting. Eishō produced few paintings, and his reasons for giving up printmaking are unknown. A painting that remains is a handscroll of Eishi as an old man, made perhaps in the 1810s or 1820s. Chōkōsai Eishō (c. 1795–98) Tsuruya uchi tsurunou.jpg, Chōkōsai Eishō (c. 1794–96) Goshoguruma.jpg, Chōkōsai Eishō (c. 1795–98) Okamotoya uchi shinateru.jpg, Chokosai Eisho (act. c. 1795-1801). 'Minister Narihira’s Coming of Age,' Japan, Edo period (1615–1868), c. 1790s. Woodblock print; ink and color on paper. Gift of James A. Michener, 1991. (22064a-c).jpg,

References

Works cited

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