painting;
hanging scroll
- Museum number
- 1913,0501,0.288
- Description
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Painting, hanging scroll. Courtesan walking, wearing kimono decorated with swimming carp. Ink, colour and gold on silk. Signed and sealed.
- Production date
- 1818-1830 (c.)
- Dimensions
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Height: 209 centimetres (mount)
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Height: 120 centimetres
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Height: 41.50 centimetres
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Width: 60.70 centimetres (mount)
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
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A courtesan wearing a magnificent surcoat processes forward, while turning to look over her shoulder, posing so as to show off to best advantage the designs and patterns on the back of her robes and their skirts. Most striking is the design on the surcoat of teeming carp gliding in the water; the subject of carp and pondweed was used frequently in hangingscroll paintings by Hokusai and his pupils. Great play is given to the design of swirls and scattered maple leaves on the skirts, equally to the geometric pattern of interlocking crosses on the sash. This reminds us that ukiyo-e paintings of beautiful women were first and foremost preoccupied with the depiction of gorgeous patterns on their robes. This painting is by Gakutei, a pupil of Totoya Hokkei (1780–1850) of the school of Hokusai, who was active from the late Bunka era (1804–18) until at least 1869. The style of the woman’s face also shows the clear influence of the Utagawa-school artists active in the early nineteenth century. Gakutei was at one time also a pupil of Tsutsumi Shu-ei (d. 1814), who claimed artistic descent from the great medieval ink painter Sesshu- (1420–1506); his classical-style ink-painting technique was therefore highly syncretic. [NMa]
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About 1823, based on the form of the signature (Martijn Helewihn, 06/07)
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Clark 1992
In the Bunsei era (1818-30) the fashions worn by courtesans became evermore gaudy and elaborate: veritable aureoles of tortoiseshell hairpins with flowers carved on the ends ('hana-kanzashi'); surcoats ('uchikake') with designs of dragons and tigers, padded to give a three-dimensional effect and embroidered with gold thread; wide brocade 'obi' tied in an ostentatious knot at the front; and high black lacquer clogs. We can only marvel at the taste of the times which undoubtedly found such extravagances attractive and at the stamina of the courtesans who managed to carry them off.
Here the woman is turning so as to display the fabulous design of swimming carp that was probably painted directly in 'sumi' on to the silk of her 'uchikake'. These are reminiscent of the famous 'surimono' showing a carp leaping up a waterfall which Gakutei designed in c. 1828. She lifts the scarlet end of her geometrically patterned 'obi' with a flourish behind her head, the more to show off the radiating hairpins. Her gritted teeth and squint suggest a formidable character, and again we can savour the peculiarity of late-Edo aesthetics, like exotic hybrids of cultivated flowers.
The painting is technically extremely accomplished and in an individual style not dominated by either of the prevailing Hokusai or Utagawa idioms.
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Asahi 1996
文政年間、遊女の衣装は一層豪華で手の込んだものとなった。後光のような鼈甲の花簪、たっぷりと綿入れされ金糸で縫い取られた龍虎模様の打掛、前で大袈裟に結ばれた幅広の帯、漆塗りの高下駄。我々は、この度を越した贅沢を魅力的と感じた時代性と、これらを着こなした遊女の体力にただ感嘆するのみである。
ここでは、途方もない打掛を見せびらかそうと遊女は後向きになっている。打掛の鯉模様は、おそらく絹地に直接墨で描かれたもので、鯉の滝登りを描いた岳亭の著名な摺物（文政11年頃）を思い出させる。遊女は幾何学模様の帯の赤い端を頭のところまで掲げており、過激な簪が一層目立つ。お歯黒をつけた口元や斜視気味の目元は、彼女の手ごわさを感じさせる。ここでも我々は、栽培花の異国的な雑種性ともいうべき江戸時代後期の美学を味わうことができる。
本作品は技術的には完成されており、当時流行していた北斎流にも歌川流にも支配されない、岳亭の個性的様式が見られる。
（竹内美砂子（名古屋市博物館））
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
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Exhibited:
2011 Jun-Oct, London, BM, Japanese Galleries, 'Japan from prehistory to the present'
2013 3 Oct - 2014 5 Jan, London, BM, Shunga: Sex and pleasure in Japanese art, 1600-1900
- Acquisition date
- 1913
- Acquisition notes
- The collection of Japanese and Chinese paintings belonging to Arthur Morrison was purchased by Sir William Gwynne-Evans, who presented it to the British Museum in 1913.
- Department
- Asia
- Registration number
- 1913,0501,0.288
- Additional IDs
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Asia painting number: Jap.Ptg.1500 (Japanese Painting Number)
