Beauty at the Mimeguri Shrine
Utagawa Toyohiro
1804–1818
- Medium
- Hanging scroll; ink, colors and gold pigment on silk
- Dimensions
- 70.5 × 26.5 cm (27 3/4 × 10 7/16 in.); Mounting: 158.1 × 37.2 cm (62 1/4 × 14 5/8 in.); Width including lower roller: W.: 42.6 cm (16 3/4 in.)
- Genre
- hanging scroll
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago
Tags
paintinginkgold leafasian arthanging scrollsilk (textile)Japanese (culture or style)
About
This fashionable woman is enjoying a cool evening by the Mimeguri Shrine, located on an embankment of the Sumida River, which flows through central Tokyo. Her clothing advertises her sophistication: a chic lightweight black kimono that reveals the colors of her robes underneath, with a complementary obi (sash). Toyohiro was a second-generation artist of the Utagawa School, the most prominent painters of ukiyo-e, or “floating world” pictures. The phrase “floating world” describes a way of life in premodern Japanese cities (17th–19th centuries) that celebrated enjoyment in fleeting pleasures such as art, beauty, and fashion.
