Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797-1861) A Comparison of the Ogura One Hundred Poets, 35: Kurrukaya Doshin, 1847. Oban.
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One of the less acknowledged achievements of the ukiyo-e artists is their intellectual contribution to the arts. Artists such as Kuniyoshi not only represented well known dramas or historic scenes, they also made works (especially after the Tenpo Reforms of the 1840’s) that were full of great poetry and literary allusion and metaphor. Nowhere is this clearer than in the fine collection of prints The Hundred Poets Compared. In this series, artists including Kuniyoshi chose poems and fitted these allusive works with an appropriate tale or character. Note however that the poem and the tale are not obviously related - it may only be a word or a syllable or, as in this case, a location. The artist was then obliged to create a design that would, through allusion, relate the two pieces of text to each other through the picture. Often these metaphors or visual puns are elusive and it can be hard for us today to appreciate these great achievements.
This fine print depicts the story of the tragic Shigeuji. Shigeuji was the commander of the Imperial palace at Kyoto. To show her appreciation, the mother of the Emperor gifted him a beautiful girl to be his mistress. He was delighted to see that his wife and his mistress seemed to get on terrifically well and enjoy games together. One day, the two women fell asleep and Shigeuji chanced upon them sprawled together and saw their hair mystically transformed into writhing, fighting snakes. He perceived that the two women were not friends at all and left the palace immediately, leaving behind his wife and two year old child. Years passed as his devastated family searched for him, eventually tracking him to a remote all male monastery. His wife briefed the young boy to enter and seek out his father. The print shows the moment of recognition. Shigeuji has taken the name, Kurrukaya Doshin… his young son, seeing the mole on his father’s face pleads with him to come home but Doshin turns away; he has taken a vow of solitude and must not return.
Kuniyoshi shows maple leaves falling, branches without flowers. The poem by Tsurayuki reads:
With people, well
you can never know their hearts
but in my village
the flowers brightly bloom with
the scent of the days of old.
The changeability of people’s feelings is the theme, culminating in the feelings of father to son.
Colour and impression are fine but the print has been re-margined and there are some small areas of soiling and minor creasing.
24 x 36 cm.
