Covering the period from the beginning of the Japanese woodblock print in the 1680s until the year 1900, Japanese Woodblock Prints provides a detailed survey of all the major artists, along with the images on which their fame rests. Japanese Woodblock Prints includes detailed histories of the publishers of woodblock prints--who were often the driving force determining which prints, and therefore which artists, would make it into mass circulation for a chance at critical and popular success. --from publisher description.