Images of the Floating World and from the Modern Era
- Gallery East

The long and rich heritage of printmaking in Japan is well suited to the Japanese temperament which prizes excellence, precise craftsmanship, respect for materials, artistic sensitivity and an eye for composition, balance and colour.

Japanese woodblock prints of the 18^th and 19^th Centuries record an exotic, vibrant, colourful and highly sophisticated society in a form which constitutes a significant element in the history of graphic art. The imagery takes the viewer into a world of Kabuki plays and actors, courtesans and beautiful women, heroes of legend, historical battles, the Japanese landscape, and erotica.

Japanese Shunga (Spring Pictures) are now recognised as an uninhibited celebration of sexual pleasure, and one of the greatest evocations of sensual pleasure in world art. The exhibition includes eleven images of this uncensored world of pleasure from the 18^th and 19^th Centuries.