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Turtle Fun: Wonderful, Wonderful (Kiki myōmyō)

ca. 1848
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
Working at the end of the Edo period, the ingenious and prolific print artist Kuniyoshi brings the story of actors’ likenesses to a comic culmination in his depiction of twenty-three turtles, each with the face of a famous Kabuki actor of the day, scurrying around a red lacquer sake cup. Newly enforced publishing censorship rules from the Tenpō Reforms (1841–43) prohibited printmakers from making identifiable pictures of actors or courtesans.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • 歌川国芳画　「亀奇妙々」 　
  • Title: Turtle Fun: Wonderful, Wonderful (Kiki myōmyō)
  • Artist: Utagawa Kuniyoshi (Japanese, 1797–1861)
  • Period: Edo period (1615–1868)
  • Date: ca. 1848
  • Culture: Japan
  • Medium: Triptych of woodblock prints (nishiki-e); ink and color on paper; vertical ōban
  • Dimensions: Frame: 21 3/8 × 36 3/8 in. (54.3 × 92.4 cm)
    Image: 14 1/2 × 10 in. (36.8 × 25.4 cm)
  • Classification: Prints
  • Credit Line: Lent by Lee E. Dirks
  • Curatorial Department: Asian Art