Hideyoshi and his generals Katō Kiyomasa and Konishi Yukinaga studying a map of Korea, from the series Newly Selected Records of the Taikō Hideyoshi (Shinsen Taikōki)
新撰太閤記
- Date:
- 1883
- Medium:
- Color woodblock print
- Source:
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
新撰太閤記
This 1883 print by Utagawa Toyonobu, held by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (accession sc186226, object 254994), depicts Hideyoshi in conference with his generals Katō Kiyomasa and Konishi Yukinaga over a map of Korea, planning the Imjin War invasions of 1592 and 1597. The composition is one of the most historically charged sheets in the Shinsen Taikōki because the Meiji 1880s context resonated unmistakably with Japan's renewed interest in continental ambition, leading toward the Treaty of Ganghwa, the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, and ultimately the annexation of Korea in 1910. Hideyoshi's Korean campaigns were therefore a politically useful precedent for the early-Meiji audience, and Toyonobu's image of the unifier studying a Korean map with his two principal Christian-vs-Buddhist generals (Konishi Yukinaga was Christian; Kiyomasa was an aggressive anti-Christian Buddhist) carries an unmistakable contemporary political charge as well as its biographical narrative role. The print uses Toyonobu's mature Meiji color register of bright aniline reds and purples, with carefully drawn costume detail anchoring the figures to their historical identities.
新撰太閤記
1883
Color woodblock print
尾州桶狭間合戦
December 25, 1882
Color woodblock print
新撰太閤記
1883
Color woodblock print
新撰太閤記
1883
Color woodblock print
Hideyoshi and his generals Katō Kiyomasa and Konishi Yukinaga studying a map of Korea, from the series Newly Selected Records of the Taikō Hideyoshi (Shinsen Taikōki) (新撰太閤記) was created by Utagawa Toyonobu (歌川豊宣) in 1883.