Shunga: Erotic Art in Japan

This fascinating and lavishly illustrated introduction to the world of Japanese erotic art includes many previously unpublished images. Demonstrating a high level of artistic and technical achievement, Shunga is an under-explored area of Japanese art. This beautiful book takes a fresh look at the centrality of eroticism in Edo urban culture, including highlights from the collections of erotic Japanese art at the British Museum, which are unrivalled in Europe.

Over the course of the Edo period (1615-1868), was extraordinarily large quantity of paintings, prints and illustrated books with sexual and erotic themes produced in Japan. From the 1760s on, printed works were produced using full-colour woodblock technology and these constitute some of the finest examples of art printing in Japan, employing deluxe materials and special printing effects.

This book features pictures by some of the most renowned artists, such as Kitagawa Utamaro and Katsushika Hokusai, who produced erotic imagery as a standard part of their work.