La pérégrination vers l’Ouest

La pérégrination vers l’Ouest – Complete prints from the Japanese edition of 1806-1837 – Published in China in the 16th century, The Peregrination to the West is one of the most important novels in Asian culture. It recounts the fantastic journey across Central Asia of a Buddhist monk and his legendary escort: a sand ogre, an anthropomorphic pig, a dragon-horse and, flying on his cloud with his magic stick, the irreverent Monkey King Son Goku, who lends his spice to this tale that has been retold and adapted over the centuries, right up to Toriyama Akira’s famous Dragon Ball.
Between 1806 and 1837, booksellers in Osaka, Japan commissioned 250 engravings, including ten in color, for an ambitious illustrated edition of the work: formidable monsters, lost travelers, titanic battles… All the genius of the artists of the Edo period is expressed in these virtuoso prints which, although long attributed to Hokusai, are in fact the work of his most faithful disciple, Katsushika Taito, and two other talented picturemakers, Ohara Toya and Utagawa Toyohiro.
After considerable research and restoration work, this book presents these exceptional images in their entirety for the first time since their original publication. With a preface and commentary by Christophe Marquet (EFEO), this remarkable collection reveals the narrative power of Japanese prints, the visual soil of modern manga.