Details
Kitagawa Utamaro (1753?-1806)
Uma no koku (The Hour of the Horse [Midday]), from the series Musume hi-dokei (Sundial of Young Women), ca. 1794-95
Woodcut of a scene of women at the bath, one standing drying her ear with a towel and tucking another folded towel under her arm, one kneeling clenching in her teeth a bag of rice-bran (nukabukuro) used to exfoliate the skin and wringing a wet towel in her hands, from the series of five prints devoted to scenes of women engaged in various daylight activities, the outlines of faces rendered with gauffrage, not inked lines, the lips printed in red without black-ink outlines, yellow ground, signed Utamaro hitsu, mark of publisher Murataya Jirobei, censor's seal kiwame (certified)--good impression, slightly faded and stained, though generally good condition
oban tate-e: 15 x 10in. (37.8 x 25.7cm.)
As transcribed and translated by Asano and Clark in Utamaro (see below), the inscription to the left of the title cartouche reads: Kodai wa joyu saru no koku o motte kono zu o ataru (in olden times the women's bath as shown in this picture took place at the Hour of the Monkey [about 4pm]."
Provenance
Henri Vever (1854-1943), Paris (red seal lower right)
Literature
Pari Beberu korekushon ukiyoe meisaku 300 senten 300 Masterpieces of Ukiyo-e Prints from the Vever Collection, exh. cat. (Tokyo: Nihon Keizei shinbunsha, 1975), no. 172.
Jack Hillier, Japanese Prints and Drawings from the Vever Collection (London and New York: Philip Wilson Publishers, Rizzoli International and Sotheby Parke Bernet, 1976), no. 419.
Jack Hillier, Suzuki Juzo and Adachi Toyohisa, Ukiyoe Beberu korekushon (Ukiyo-e from the Vever Collection) (Tokyo: Nihon Keizai shinbunsha, 1976), no. 415.
Utamaro: Estampes, Livres Illustrées, exh. cat. (Paris: Galerie Huguette Berès, 1976), no. 45.
Sotheby's, London, Highly Important Japanese Prints from the Henri Vever Collection: Final Part, 30 October 1997, lot 88.
Exhibited
"Pari Beberu korekushon ukiyoe meisaku 300 senten 300 Masterpieces of Ukiyo-e Prints from the Vever Collection," shown at the following venues:
Keio Department Store, Tokyo, 1975.1.4-15
Hanshin Department Store, Osaka, 1975.2.6-18
Sogo Department Store, Hiroshima, 1975.4.21-26
"Utamaro: Estampes, Livres Illustrées," Galerie Huguette Berès, Paris, 1976
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1999; "The Max Palevsky Collection of Japanese Woodblock Prints," 2001.2.8-5.15
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