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Utagawa Kunisada (Toyokuni III)Beauty Otami - Kabukic. 1800-1810
c. 1800-1810
About the Item
Beauty Otami - Kabuki
Note: Kabuki actor Nakamura Matsue is in the role of courtesan otami. She is standing in front of a small tea shop in a garden.
Color woodblock, c. 1800-1810
Signed by Toyokuni ga (see photo)
Publisher: Yamamotoya Heikichi (Eikyudo), see photo
Impression: Very good impression and color
Condition: Excellent
Sheet/Image size: 15 x 10 3/8 inches
Note: Kabuki actor Nakamura Matsue is in the role of courtesan otami. She is standing in front of a small tea shop in a garden.
Utagawa Toyokuni I (1769-1825)
Toyokuni Utagawa was one of the great printmakers of the late 18th century who made himself known by his ukiyo-e of beautiful women and later of actors. As the head of the Utagawa school he was also the most influential man on the next generation of ukiyo-e designers.
Toyokuni was born the son of a puppet maker. He learned printmaking as a student of Toyoharu. At the beginning of his career he concentrated on bijin-ga - images of beautiful women. His early works were influenced by Kiyonaga and Shigemasa.
Toyokuni's success and fame came when he started making actor portraits and actor scenes. The Kabuki theaters were very crowded at that time and the best known actors were a kind of public icons. Consequently prints related to Kabuki were a hot business. Demand came from the theaters - for advertising material - and from the fans - in the form of actor portraits. The production of actor portraits was like today's publication of celebrity posters.
When the demand for actor prints grew faster than the master could design, the great moment of the Utagawa School had come. An ever increasing number of students produced actor prints and book illustrations. The Utagawa School was buzzing with commissions.
The Utagawa School flourished so well that Toyokuni Utagawa is sometimes mentioned as the founder of the Utagawa School, but that was actually Toyoharu. Toyokuni, however, was the one who made it big and who went into mass production. The comparison may be a bit daring. But basically the Utagawa School was something like the Andy Warhol factory of the Pop Art culture - at least in commercial terms.
The best known ukiyo-e students of the master Toyokuni Utagawa were Kunisada Utagawa and Kuniyoshi Utagawa. The tombstone of Toyokuni listed altogether 29 students.
After the death of Toyokuni in 1825, two of his pupils rivaled about who had the right to become his successor - the conceited Kunisada, who considered himself the greatest on earth anyway, and Toyoshige, a mediocre printmaker who had the advantage of having married his deceased master's daughter. The row about the succession to Toyokuni as the head of the Utagawa School was fought on arguments over who was the best ukiyo-e designer. But that was an argument on the surface. The real fight was about who got control of a flourishing business company - the Utagawa School.
Toyoshige won the fight but died in 1835. From 1844 on Kunisada called himself Toyokuni. In today's literature Kunisada is referred to as Toyokuni III, Toyoshige as Toyokuni II and the master as Toyokuni I.
Courtesy, Artelino Literature sources used for this biography:
• Richard Lane, Images from the Floating World (New York: Konecky & Konecky, 1978)
• Laurance P.Roberts, A Dictionary of Japanese Artists (New York: John Weatherhill Inc., 1976)
- Creator:Utagawa Kunisada (Toyokuni III) (1786-1864, Japanese)
- Creation Year:c. 1800-1810
- Dimensions:Height: 15 in (38.1 cm)Width: 10.38 in (26.37 cm)
- Medium:
- Period:
- Condition:Very good. Creased. Thin areas around edges. Tear 0.5cm, on the bottom edge.
- Gallery Location:Fairlawn, OH
- Reference Number:Seller: UK22431stDibs: LU14013620852
Utagawa Kunisada (Toyokuni III)
Born in the Honjo district of Edo as Kunisada Tsunoda, Kunisada’s family owned a small hereditary ferryboat service. Though his father, an amateur poet, died when Kunisada was a child, the family business provided some financial security. During his childhood, he showed considerable promise in painting and drawing. Due to strong familial ties with literary and theatrical circles, he spent time studying actor portraits. At age 14, he was admitted to study under Toyokuni, head of the Utagawa school. Kunisada's work embodies the characteristics of the Utagawa school, focusing on traditional subjects such as kabuki, bijin (beautiful women), shunga (erotic prints), and historical prints. His first known print dates to 1807, his first illustrated book to 1808. Kunisada’s career took off from the beginning. Many of his works became overnight successes and he was considered the “star attraction†of the Utagawa school. He signed his works “Kunisada,†sometimes with the studio names of Gototei and Kochoro affixed. In 1844, he adopted the name of his teacher and became Toyokuni III. Kunisada passed away in 1864 in the same neighborhood that he was born. He was 70 years old. Kunis
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