Kunisada: Beauty and View of Station Yoshiwara (Sold)

Artist: Utagawa Kunisada (1786-1865)
Title: Beauty and View of Station Yoshiwara

Series: Fifty-three Stations of the Tôkaidô Road (Tokaido gojusan tsugi no uchi)
Date: ca. 1838

A beauty dressed auspiciously for visiting a shrine looks off into the distance; behind her is the scene of travelers approaching Mount Fuji on horseback along a trail lined with pine trees that is directly lifted from Hiroshige’s iconic Hoeido Tokaido. The beauty seems to be dressed as a shrine pilgrim; she and the background scene seem to be connected by a cloud of imagination. In today’s terms this would be called a cross-promotional mashup, but it is very interesting indeed to see the combining of these two towering figures of ukiyo-e.

Condition: Very good impression, color and condition.
Dimensions: chûban 25.2 x 18.6 cm
Publisher: Sanoya Kihei
Literature: Andreas Marks, Kunisada's Tokaido: Riddles in Japanese Woodblock Prints, 2013, p. 75, cat. no. T24-50, and pp. 76-83 (on series). See each Kunisada work compared with the Hiroshige Tokaido work at hiroshige.org.uk

Signature: Kôchôrô Kunisada ga

SKU: KUC035S