Courtesan from the Myōgaya House
Torii Kiyomasu I Japanese
Not on view
The subject of this print attributed to Torii Kiyomasu is a standing courtesan reading a poem slip. The inscription on the print, Komachi in the Yoshiwara District, refers to the famous Heian poetess, Ono no Komachi, and is thus an acknowledgement of the literary accomplishments of many Yoshiwara courtesans. The unfinished fragment, evoking the hope and the cyclical nature of spring, reads as follows:
Life is full of trouble,
but the plum blossoms by the window . . .
The woman is tiny, but in her voluminous robes with their large-scale decoration of myōga (Japanese ginger), she boldly promotes her house while conveying an ageless grandeur that echoes the sentiment of the poem.
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