この展示室のワークシート「浮世」とは、もともと「つらい世の中（憂き世）」という意味でしたが、江戸時代には「今を楽しむ、うきうきした世の中」という意味で使われるようになりました。浮世絵は、そんな江戸の人々の流行や、人気の役者や美人、名所の風景を描いた絵です。17世紀後半に菱川師宣が、版画で多くの人に届けたことから広がりました。
Ukiyo once meant 'the sad world', but in the Edo period it came to mean 'the floating world', a cheerful world of enjoying the moment. Ukiyo-e, 'pictures of the floating world', showed the fashions of Edo, popular actors, beautiful women and famous places. In the late 17th century, Hishikawa Moronobu helped spread them by making prints that many people could buy.
浮世絵版画は、チームで作られました。絵師が下絵を描き、彫師が桜の板に彫り、摺師が色ごとに版を重ねて紙に摺ります。全体をプロデュースしたのが、版元（出版社）です。1765年ごろ、鈴木春信たちが多色摺りの「錦絵」を完成させると、まるで錦の織物のように色あざやかな版画が生まれました。
Ukiyo-e prints were made by a team. The designer drew the picture, the carver cut it into cherry-wood blocks, and the printer pressed one block for each color onto paper. The whole project was run by the publisher. Around 1765, Suzuki Harunobu and others perfected full-color printing, called nishiki-e, or 'brocade pictures', because they were as colorful as woven silk.
18世紀の終わりには喜多川歌麿の美人画、東洲斎写楽の役者絵が評判になり、19世紀には葛飾北斎の『冨嶽三十六景』や歌川広重の『東海道五拾三次』が、旅ブームとともに大ヒットしました。歌川国芳は猫や巨大ながいこつ、だまし絵で人々を楽しませ、明治になると、月岡芳年が浮世絵の最後の時代をいろどり、国芳と狩野派の両方に学んだ河鍋暁斎も、絵画や版画で活躍しました。
In the late 18th century, Utamaro's beautiful women and Sharaku's actor portraits were the talk of the town. In the 19th century, Hokusai's Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji and Hiroshige's Fifty-three Stations of the Tōkaidō became big hits during a travel boom. Kuniyoshi delighted people with cats, giant skeletons and visual tricks. In the Meiji era, Yoshitoshi became one of the last great ukiyo-e artists, and Kyōsai, who studied under both Kuniyoshi and the Kanō school, also did brilliant work in painting and prints.
