Adorning a Man's Hat with Flowers

Yoshikawa Kanpō, best known as a designer of woodblock prints, was also a lifelong collector of historical artifacts related to Japanese customs. During his lifetime he amassed a collection of some 30, 000 objects. Kanpō’s vast knowledge of ancient customs and costume was put to use in the present painting, which depicts an ancient Japanese custom known as kazashi, a Shintō ritual whereby a person’s head or headdress is adorned with flowers and/or leaves. In this picture, a woman at center pins a small bouquet of five cherry blossoms to the hat of the man at left. A younger attendant stands to her right and holds a second small bouquet of the same flowers. All three figures wear costume of the Nara-period (710–794) imperial court.