Page:A history of Japanese colour-prints by Woldemar von Seidlitz.djvu/326

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148
JAPANESE COLOUR-PRINTS
  • on the left a woman half undressed, her foot playing in the water with fish swimming about it; behind her a woman standing; to the right is one wringing water out of her clothes, and beside her a companion kneeling by a basket. The half-clad figures, which Goncourt rightly calls un peu mannequinèes, are drawn with uncommon precision; the outlines of the nude are printed in a dark reddish brown.
  • Female divers in junks.

Utamaro also published a countless number of series, of which the following may be mentioned:—

  • Geishas celebrating the Niwaka Festival, 6 sheets (dating from the seventies?).
  • Signboards of the most celebrated saké-houses, represented by women who have at their feet purple mats and stand out against the yellow background; 6 sheets, about 1790.
  • The Kamuros of the Yoshiwara, 6 sheets, also a continuation in 7 sheets.
  • Courtesans and geishas compared with flowers.
  • The five festal days.
  • The six arms of the Tamagawa River, women on undulating ground; at the top views on fans.
  • The six views of the Tamagawa River, women promenading.
  • Women compared with landscapes in the vicinity of the Yoshiwara, 8 sheets.
  • The six poetesses.
  • Courtesans compared with the six poets.
  • The story of the fair Osomi and the clerk Hisamatsu.
  • Examples of beautiful women typifying the seven-fold fortune, the gods of fortune each represented by a female figure in a circular frame.
  • Half-length figures on a mica ground, two series of ten leaves each (illustrated in Kurth, pl. 17, a girl before a mirror).
  • Half-length figures of women in pairs, several series; among them one representing the four seasons, and another of the same kind representing the twelve hours of the day.
  • Large heads, more than a hundred sheets.
  • Bijin ichisai goyusan tsugi, the fifty-three stations of the Tokaido