Kubo Shunman 窪俊満: New Year’s Surimono with Two Beauties and Noh Screen from the Feather Robe Noh drama
Artist: Kubo Shunman (1757-1820)
Title: New Year’s Surimono with Two Beauties and Noh Screen from the Feather Robe Noh drama Date: Kansei 6 (1794), Year of Gi-no-Tiger, Spring New Year 寛政6、甲寅年春正月 Dimensions: 18.5 x 25.3 cm
Our view is of an intimate and rather mysterious New Year’s scene, with the ladies at left presumably at home, shown at left behind a single-leaf wooden screen which depicts a scene from the Noh drama “The Feather Robe (Hagoromo羽衣)”.
The screen occupies the large part of this print, whereas the ladies behind are just glimpsed, who seem to be watching something happening behind the screen, as they are reacting to some sort of activity unseen to the viewer. The woman in the blue kimono seems to be leaning aside on her both hands on the tatami mat, and a second woman in a kimono with chrysanthemum patterns against purple seems just about to make a move with her open left hand. Next to them is a sanpô-dai high tray with a small plate. The screen is framed in black lacquer, its surface showing prominent woodgrain. A fisherman in a symbolic fisherman’s grass skirt who holds a fishing rod is approaching a pine tree, which is covered by an obi tie, symbolizing an angel’s costume; the feather robe. The major outline of the story is as follows: A fisherman finds the feather robe of an angel at Miho no Matsubara, along the Suruga Bay, a cape with white sand and green pine trees facing Mt. Fuji. The angel asks to have it back, and the fisherman responds that he will return the robe if she performs a dance. The angel wearing the robe dances a graceful and beautiful dance with Mt. Fuji in the background, full of spring spirit, with both elegance and grace, and gradually transitions to performing a spectacular dance. Then numerous treasures fall to the ground, and the angel returns to heaven.
The large wooden screen that rests rather diagonally in the foreground probably indicates a New Year celebration in this large room. The scene does not show us the owner of the feather robe, namely the angel from the heaven, but this composition brings our imagination to a dancing angel behind the screen, at what two ladies must be watching. (With thanks to Michiko Sato-Grube for her research.)
Condition: Excellent impression and color. Good condition. With minor soiling to left edges and ink writing verso. With a crease down the middle that is not really visible except for at the very bottom, where there is a nick in the paper.
Signed: Shôsa-dô Kubo Shunman ga 尚左堂窪俊満画 (with his seal Shunman in red)
SKU: SUR072