Database's Grate Wave

The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai.

A favourite online digital resource that I always return to is ukiyo-e.org. I adore this website. And visit frequently. The benefits of this resource are astronomical in how it has assisted art historians and archivists who interact with ukiyo-e.

Ukiyo-e is traditional Japanese woodblock print art. The most well-known example is the Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai. The original design was created and printed around 1830 – 32. It is the feature image I've chosen for this particular blog post because it helps explain how this website has been a beneficial tool. Using ukiyo-e.org historians and archivists can look at other institutes' prints of the Grate Wave efficiently. But they also can look at thousands of Ukiyo-e from different eras and styles. This broadens what has been known about lesser (but stunning) artists across the globe. A vast contemporary art collection is also available to the public for online viewing.

John Resig, a well-known American software engineer and entrepreneur, noticed in his research of ukiyo-e that there was a massive issue. The past efforts that went into digitizing the art collections in each institute have resulted in every institute having its own way of organizing its archives and databases. And this has created a struggle that is amplified by comparing print art that appears similar. (I cannot even begin to talk about how there are reprints, the long history of ownership, recreations that were done, language barriers, nor how the art is being repurposed in our contemporary era, and how this is fascinating). Archives and historians can look at their digital collections using one common site and communicate with a larger group of global art historians. ukiyo-e.org is written in Japanese and English (a site user can easily change the language).

The code behind the site's image similarity analysis engine component that John Resig and Steve Sisney created is beyond my realm of knowledge. But it has had a large impact on the historical ukiyo-e community. The site launched in 2012 and created a massive wave. To quote the site, “The database currently contains over 213,000 prints from 24 institutions and, as of September 2013, has received 3.4 million page views from 150,000 people.” The level of collaboration between museums, universities, collectors, art enthusiasts, and other institutions has led to the re-discovery of art pieces. Being able to compare prints with prints from other institutions internationally with a consistent language enabled researchers to trace the lineage of the signature or stamps that identify an individual ukiyo-e’s history.

If you have time and interest, I suggest looking at ukiyo-e.org

And see where that journey takes you.

Are there any online databases that you keep returning to?

Resources

Image: Katsushika Hokusai, The Great Wave, from the series “Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji”. Woodblock print (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper Japanese Art. Met's Open Access API. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/45434

Davis, Julie Nelson. 2015. Partners in Print: Artistic Collaboration and the Ukiyo-e Market. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Forrer, Matthi. 2020. “Katsushika Hokusai.” Art History. Oxford University Press.https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/9780199920105-0157.

Resig , John, and Steve Sisney, eds. “Japanese Woodblock Print Search - Ukiyo-e Search.” Ukiyo-e Search, 2012. https://ukiyo-e.org/

Stewart, J. (2017, September 21). 220,000+ Japanese woodblock prints available online in growing database. My Modern Met. https://mymodernmet.com/japanese-woodblock-ukiyo-e-online-database/