Kitano Tsunetomi (北野恒富) (artist 1880 – 1947)
Umegawa [梅川] from the play Meido no hikyaku ['The Courier of Hell' - 冥途の飛脚]
04/1922
11.5 in x 16 in (Overall dimensions) Japanese woodblock print
Seal: Tsunetomi (恒富)
Waseda University
Honolulu Museum of Arts
Art Institute of Chicago
The National Museum of Asian Art
Rijksmuseum
Centre Céramique de Maastricht
Lyon Collection - another version of this print by Tsunetomi The tradition of Umegawa in print form goes way back. Chikamatsu wrote a play in 1711 for the puppet theater where a poor young man, Chūbei falls in love with a prostitute name Umegawa. This couple was portrayed in a print by Sharaku as early in 1794.
For the 200th anniversary of Chikamatsu's birth, from 1922-25, a project of 15 volumes of his plays was produced. This was accompanied by a supplement of 16 prints. Some consider this print the best of the lot.
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Printed below the image: 西村熊吉; 山岸主計; et al.
The blocks were carved by Yamagishi Kazue and printed by Nishimura Kumakichi.
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At Scholten Japanese Art they said of this print: "This is the first print from a collaborative series of 18 prints depicting famous roles from plays written by Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653-1725) which were published to accompany a set of 16 volumes of his work that were issued on a monthly basis starting in April 1922."
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There are other copies of this print in the David Owsley Museum of Art, Ball State University and at the John and Mabel Ringling Museum of Art.
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Illustrated:
1) There is a small black and white illustration of this print in The New Wave: Twentieth-century Japanese Prints in the Robert O. Muller Collection edited by Amy Reigle Stephens, Bamboo Publishing, Inc. and Hotei - Japanese Prints, number 138, page 133.
Both the example in Chicago and in Honolulu give the title Umegawa to this print. This is the name of a character in the play Meido no hikyaku [冥土の飛脚 - The Courier from Hell].
2) in black and white in 近代日本美人画展 : 伝統木版画を支えた作家たち Exhibition of Modern Japanese Beauties: Meiji, Taishō, Shōwa, Riccar Art Museum, 1982, n.p., no. 63.
3) in color in The Female Image: 20th century prints of Japanese beauties, Abe Publisher, 2000, #106, p. 86.
4) in a small black and white reproduction in the "Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago, under 'Gifts and loans', vol. 23, #2, 1929, p. 21 [Misidentified as being by Suge Tateshiko.]
modern prints (shin hanga - 新版画) (genre)
Taishō era (大正時代) (genre)
Chikamatsu Monzaemon (近松門左衛門) (author)