Utagawa Toyokuni I (初代歌川豊国) (artist 1769 – 02/24/1825)
An oiran holding a bouquet of gift-wrapped chrysanthemums - Zodiac sign of the monkey - the 9th month
ca 1811 – 1814
9.75 in x 14.25 in (Overall dimensions) Japanese woodblock prin
Signed: Toyokuni ga (豊国画)
Gyōji censor seal: Tsurukin
Censor's seal: kiwame
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna
Museum für angewandte Kunst, Vienna - another print with a publisher's seal from this possible triptych There are at least 12 prints in this series. Each beauty is meant to represent one of the months. As a series, these prints were grouped into sets of 3 occasionally representing one sign. Sometimes the Zodiac sign needs to be teased out from a rebus found in the fan decorations. Toyokuni's literate audience would have been able to understand these, but some of them elude us today
We do not yet know all of the prints in this series.
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There is no publisher's seal on either this print or the copy in Vienna. However, they believe that the publisher was probably Oyamaya Hangorō because this print is thought to be one panel of a group of zodiacal triptychs. The seal appears on another print in the group.
Note that Marks refers this publisher simply as Oyama Hangorō.
The oiran's robe is decorated with a shimenawa or sacred rope motif. Hanging from it appear to be white sheets of paper. Both are used together in Shinto imagery as is the monkey holding the wand with shide or zig-zag sheets of paper seen in the fan in the upper left of this print.
beautiful women (bijin-ga - 美人画) (genre)
mitate-e (見立て絵) (genre)
Oyama Hangorō (小山屋半五郎) (publisher)