Craftsmen's shops in Kyoto

This interesting screen shows a variety of professions including barber, archery-maker, carpenter, armour-maker, lacquerer, brush-maker, blacksmith, carver, thread-maker, monkey trainer and boatman. Screens of this type are known as Shokunin zukushi, or "All the professions," and come out of genre screens depicting everyday urban life like "Scenes in and around the capital" (lot 123). The city here may also be Kyoto, and the river in the lower right the Kamo, but the painter has not included indentifying landmarks. Rather he has concentrated on the bustle of the Edo cityscape. For another view of an armour shop see lot 145.