Object data
nishikie, with metallic pigments and blindprinting
height 197 mm × width 180 mm
Utagawa Kunisada (I)
A Samurai Standing Under Cherry Trees
Japan, Japan, Japan, 1827
Provenance
…; purchased from the dealer Aoika, Japan, by J.H.W. Goslings (1943-2011), Epse, near Deventer, 1989;1 by whom donated to the museum, 1991
Object number: RP-P-1991-658
Credit line: Gift of J.H.W. Goslings, Epse
Copyright: Public domain
Context
Ichikawa Danjuro VII (1791-1859) acted under this name from XI/1800 to III/1832, when he adopted the name Ichikawa Ebizo V.
The artist
Utagawa Kunisada (1786-1865) was a pupil of Utagawa Toyokuni, who dominated the field of kabuki prints until his death. Kunisada's prints of beautiful women, bijinga, were also very successful. Only well after he had established himself as a designer of actor prints did he enter the world of surimono design, becoming the most prolific designer of surimono in the Utagawa tradition. He also used the art-names Ichiyusai, Gototei and Kochoro.
Entry
A samurai standing under flowering cherries at night, raising his wicker hat.
Print from the diptych A Series of Two Prints, Nibantsuzuki.
The samurai is the kabuki actor Ichikawa Danjuro VII as Fuwa Banzaemon, a role he interpreted several times. This print was probably made after a performance of the play Soga no shimadai, staged in I/1827 at the Kawarasaki Theatre.2 Another possible occasion would be after his interpretation of the same role in Edosuki kiku no datezome, staged in XI/1831 at the Ichimura Theatre in Edo.3 The left sheet of this diptych shows Onoe Kikugoro III (1784-1849) in the role of Nagoya Sanza.
Two poems by Fukusaien Yonenari [not the same as Honensha Yonenari, a pupil of Fukunoya Uchinari],4 and Fukuyoshi Harutomo.
In the first poem, the ‘evening cherry’ is likened to snow; the second is so associative that it can hardly be translated, going from ‘the new bamboo blinds in the main street of the Yoshiwara’ to an ‘over-kimono’ and then to ‘the man in the moon shining on the blossoms’.
Here, the title ‘A Series of Two Prints’ simply indicates that this print is one half of a diptych.
The Shipporen was never very active as publishers.
We only know of Kyoka on the Suikoden, Kyoka Suikoden, a volume with illustrations by Gakutei dating from 1822,5 and, by the same designer, a series for 1832 of seven prints with beauties as the Seven Gods of Fortune or Luck, titled A Parody on the Seven Gods of Good Fortune, Mitate shichifukujin (RP-P-1958-393, RP-P-1991-551).
Issued by the Shipporen
Signature reading: Gototei Kunisada ga, with Toshidama rings
Literature
M. Forrer, Surimono in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, Leiden 2013, no. 554
Citation
M. Forrer, 2013, 'Utagawa (I) Kunisada, A Samurai Standing Under Cherry Trees, Japan, 1827', in Surimono from the Goslings Collection in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.446750
(accessed 20 September 2024 19:38:28).