Nishiki-e

Suzuki Harunobu (about 1724–1770), "Parading Courtesan with Attendants", Late 1760, Nishiki-e (brocade print) V&A Museum no. E.1416–1898

Nishiki-e (錦絵; "brocade picture") is a type of Japanese multi-coloured woodblock printing; the technique is used primarily in ukiyo-e. It was invented in the 1760s, and perfected and popularized by the printmaker Suzuki Harunobu, who produced many nishiki-e prints between 1765 and his death five years later.

Previously, most prints had been in black-and-white, coloured by hand, or coloured with the addition of one or two colour ink blocks. A nishiki-e print is created by carving a separate woodblock for every colour, and using them in a stepwise fashion. An engraver by the name of Kinroku is credited with the technical innovations that allowed so many blocks of separate colours to fit together perfectly on the page, in order to create a single complete image.

Harunobu himself contributed to the technique's refinement by using superior materials, including cherry wood blocks in place of the more common catalpa, and a thicker application of pigment to achieve an opaque effect. While the earlier benizuri-e technique, introduced some twenty years before, had allowed printing in only three or four colours, Harunobu's nishiki-e could combine five to eight, occasionally as many as ten, colour blocks on a single sheet.

This style and technique is also known as Edo-e (江戸絵, edo-e), referring to Edo, the name for Tokyo before it became the capital.