Spring Smelling Flowers
Artist: Suzuki Harunobu (Japanese, ca. 1724-1770)
Date: about 1768
Dimensions:
sheet: 10 15/16 x 8 1/8 in. (27.8 x 20.6 cm)
Medium: colored woodblock print
Classification: Prints
Credit Line: Carrie L. Brown Bequest Fund
Object number: 1951.283
Label Text:Suzuki Harunobu developed an idealized beauty type that became very popular in the late 18th century, spurring many imitators. In this composition, two lithe, graceful figures turn toward each other in a delicate exchange. The young girl abandons the badminton-type game she had been playing and reaches up to the geisha, who is holding a kitten in the bosom of her kimono.
Harunobu’s scene of domestic comfort and affection between the courtesan and the young child—who herself will one day become a geisha—contains a touch of melancholy: the flowering plum tree for which the print is titled contrasts with the winter scene on the painted screen. The contrast is emphasized by the poem on the screen:
Although everywhere
the light of spring
has come;
still in the hills of Yoshino
it is snowing.
Not on view
In Collection(s)