"I Want to Deliver Laughing Pictures": Masako Asaba and Her Homages to Shunga

Masako Asaba is an artist who expresses her love for iconic Shunga oeuvres of Kuniyoshi, Harunobu, and especially for Utamaro’s Utamakura/Pillow book series through colorful Pop Art Porn: Bedroom Paintings of the American Artist Tom Wesselmann, Max Ernst's Famous Collage Novel, and sculpture. His colorful works, influenced by fauvism and abstractionism, are great examples of the pop art genre. She also incorporates her favorite masterpieces into the modern environment, resurrecting the abandoned erotic genre as an element of fashion and interior design. Entranced by the beautiful courtesans of the Edo period, Asaba wants to "connect the traditional Edo women with the modern post-Meiji women" to ensure the continuity of cultural achievements of local masters.

Fig. 1. Masako Asaba at the exhibition in February 2023 (j-spirit-blg.jugem.jp)

Fig. 2. Instagram.com

Fig. 3. Homage to the Utamakura series by Utamaro (Instagram.com)

Fig. 4. Lovers (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 5. Lucky cat (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 6. Lucky cat (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 7. Time Travel (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 8. Time Travel (masakoasaba.com); right: Utamaro, Lovers behind umbrella (artelino.com)

Fig. 9. Matrix (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 10. Black lodge (masakoasaba.com)

Fig. 11. Love (Instagram.com)

Fig. 11a. Utamaro, Eight Pledges at Lovers' Meetings (Ômi hakkei), ca. 1798 (ukiyo-e.org)

Geisha with a Time Machine

Masako Asaba received art training at the Joshibi University of Art and Design and, after graduating in 1982, continued her studies at KONSTFACK University College of Arts, Crafts and Design in Sweden. Since the 1990s, Asaba has been exhibiting in Japan and, since the new millennium, abroad. Her first solo show happened at Ginza Surugadai Gallery in 1996. The recent solo exhibition was held at the Kobayashi Gallery in November 2023. Judging by the paintings presented on her website, Asaba started as a yoga (Western-style) painter, producing avant-garde canvases with a touch of cubism and fauvism, however, the art collector Fuyuhiko Yamamoto notes that she was also active as a nihonga (national style) artist.

Time Travel

The first paintings and collages referencing Shunga appeared in the 2010s. The enthusiasm for this genre was caused by the artist's experience of studying abroad, which allowed her to re-estimate the cultural legacy of Japan. In her works uploaded to the Instagram account thinking_geisha, Asaba focuses on Shunga from a woman's perspective (the Women in Utamakura series) or modernizes the ukiyo-e aesthetics (the Time Travel series). The pictures, featuring lines and squares, may seem digitally produced, yet the abstract pattern is made of stripes of Japanese paper, which adds a touch of tradition to the pop art approach.

Fig. 12. Women in Utamakura, 2014 (masakoasaba.com)

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Sources: masakoasaba.com; instagram.com/thinking_geisha/; Wikipedia.org