Yoshitoshi: Fire Escape (Sold)

Artist: Tsukioka Yoshitoshi
Title: Fire Escape
Date: 1885

The Greengrocer’s Daughter Oshichi Yaoya Ascending a Ladder after Setting Fire to the Kanda District in Edo (Shoshukubai Yushuma Kakegaku). Rare design in the first edition. Oshichi climbs a bamboo ladder, her expression at odds with the scene of flames and chaos all around, perhaps reflecting her immaturity at age 15. She has committed arson in the hopes of being reunited with her crush, a temple page. Her robes are flung upward by the draft of the flames, and her positioning on a ladder over the fire seems to foreshadow her punishment of being burned at the stake for her crime.

Condition: Excellent impression, color and condition. First edition.
Dimensions: ôban diptych
Publisher: Matsui Eikichi
Literature: See “Yoshitoshi, The Splendid Decadent” number figure 41, page 74.
Seal: Yoshitoshi
Signature: Ôju Yoshitoshi

SKU: YOT541