In the nineteenth century the countries of Europe became ever more closely connected to the rest of the world. Exploration and colonization brought back objects and images that sparked the public’s imagination and gave rise to related styles across Europe. The art of China had been an influence on European design starting in the seventeenth century, and at the beginning of the nineteenth century, a fad for Egyptian design swept Europe in response to archeological discoveries. Starting with the opening of Japan in the 1850s, Japanese art became more readily available to Europeans, and in France it sparked Japonisme. For most Parisians, Japonisme was no more than a fad, but for printmakers, the influx of Japanese art— Japanese prints in particular—was a bombshell. Henri-Gustave Jossot’s The Wave (1894) humorously expresses the effect of Japanese prints, showing

Read More: ‘Print Tsunami: Japonisme and Paris’ opens at the Chazen Museum of Art