Woman Reading Message
Culture
Japanese
Artist/Culture
Otsu-e School
Daten.d.
Mediumink and opaque color on paper
Dimensionsimage: 61 × 22.7 cm (24 × 8 15/16 in.)
overall: 103.2 x 32.8 cm (40 5/8 x 12 15/16 in.)
overall: 103.2 x 32.8 cm (40 5/8 x 12 15/16 in.)
ClassificationsPaintings
Credit LineGift from the Estate of John Chandler Bancroft
Object number1901.1349
Label TextThe standing beauty is a popular subject in Otsu-e, the style of folk painting that developed concurrently with ukiyo-e in the Edo period (1600-1848). The paintings' rough powerful strokes and primary colors are characteristic of this folk tradition, but the subject is borrowed from the paintings of "the floating world" (ukiyo-e) seen elsewhere in this gallery.
The village of Otsu on the Tokaido, the main road between the capital Kyoto and Edo (modern Tokyo), produced folkish pictures to be sold to travelers and to pilgrims to the nearby temple of Miidera. Originally these paintings were of religious subjects and folk-tales, were useful and functional rather than aesthetic objects. By the latter part of the eighteenth century, however, Otsu-e were folkish versions of ukiyo-e subjects.ProvenanceEstate of John Chandler Bancroft, Boston MAOn View
Not on viewCollections
