Artist – Torii KIYONAGA (鳥居 清長) (1752 – 1815), was a Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the TORII school. He took on Torii KIYONAGA as an art name ("鳥居", name of the school, lit. "gate of the shrine", and "清長" lit. "excellent master"), and became the fourth generation head of the TORII school after the death of his adoptive father and teacher TORII Kiyomitsu.

Since TORII Kiyomitsu's son died young, and Kiyotsune (KIYONAGA's senior in the TORII school) was a less promising artist, KIYONAGA was the obvious choice to succeed Kiyomitsu to leadership of the TORII school. However, he delayed this for two years, likely devoting time to his bijin-ga and realizing the immense responsibility that would fall on his shoulders once he took over the school. Thus, in 1787, he began organizing the production of kabuki signboards and the like, which the school held a near monopoly on. He also began to train Kiyomitsu's grandson, TORII Kiyomine, who was to succeed KIYONAGA.

KIYONAGA is considered one of the great masters of the full-color nishiki-e print and of bijin-ga, images of courtesans and other beautiful women. Like most ukiyo-e artists, however, he also produced a number of prints and paintings depicting Kabuki actors and related subjects, many of them promotional materials for the theaters. He also produced a number of shunga, or erotic images.

In the field of bijin-ga, only the works of Suzuki Harunobu and a handful of others are generally regarded comparable with those of KIYONAGA. KIYONAGA produced a great many bijin-ga prints in the 1780s, and this is generally regarded as his high point; this is particularly true because he nearly stopped doing art entirely in the early 1790s. Some scholars point out the beauty of his paintings as being particularly exceptional given his commoner heritage and upbringing. Meanwhile, contemporary artists of the samurai class, who would be expected to have a better innate sense of the aesthetics and details of aristocratic culture, produced images quite arguably inferior to those of Kiyonaga.

The women in KIYONAGA's prints are often described as seeming fuller and more mature than those of his predecessor Harunobu, whose prints often depict women who seem younger and thinner. Though a difference of personal styles accounts for this primarily, it also comes in part from Kiyonaga's use of larger sheets of paper (ōban, rather than chūban or hosoban). Also, a great proportion of KIYONAGA's work is in diptych or triptych form, making the work seem larger and more impressive overall. Just as KIYONAGA can be said to have replaced the earlier Harunobu as the most popular bijinga artist of his time, so KIYONAGA can be said to have been replaced by Utamaro, whose women are even fuller and mature than those of the former.

KIYONAGA's Kabuki prints, depicting scenes on stage and the like, show a great attention to detail, and seek to depict real Kabuki scenes, rather than idealized versions. There is something very plain about much of his depictions, showing that those depicted are in fact actors and not the true idealized characters they represent; however, he did not make the leap to portraying the individual features and personalities of the actors as some other artists (including the Katsukawa school) did. Some scholars label his style as an important intermediary step leading to the bombastic, yet realistic, style of Sharaku.


Personal life - Torii KIYONAGA (鳥居 清長) was born as SEKIGUCHI Shinsuke (関口 新助) in 1752 as son of a bookseller in Edo Motozaimoku-cho (now Nihonbashi Shoshi). KIYONAGA's biological father was the owner of a number of tenements near a fish market; though his family may not have been particularly poor, he was certainly not brought up in an environment of high culture. He became pupil and was adopted by TORII Kiyomitsu, head of the TORII school. TORII Kiyomitsu (鳥居 清満, 1735 – 1785) was a famous painter and printmaker and later head of the TORII school of Japanese ukiyo-e art. Two years after TORII Kiyomitsu's death in 1785, Torii KIYONAGA succeded him as head of the TORII school.  Torii KIYONAGA died in the age of 64 on June 28th 1815 and was buried in the Sumitaku ward of Ryōkoku under his posthomous Buddhist name "Nagarin Hideki" ("は長林英樹"). His tompstone got lost due to earthquake and war damage, but a memorial monument was erected in 2013 near the supposed site of his grave in the "Eko Hospital" grounds.
 

Aliases - SEKIGUCHI Shinsuke (関口 新助),  Torii KIYONAGA (鳥居 清長)


Disciples - Amongst KIYONAGA's students are Torii Shinho , Kiyomasa Torii (grandson of TORII Kiyomitsu) , Kiyomoto Torii, Kiyotsugi, Kiyohisa, Kiyokatsu, Kiyotei, Kiyotoki, Kiyoyuki, Kiyohide II, Kiyotsune II.