"Beauty and Shamisen" by Chobunsai Eishi (1756 -1829). In Japan mostly all people call Eishi as "Chobunsai Eishi". Wonderful elegant portrait with soft colors and fine details. Beautifully embossed. Originally in Edo era, this one is re-carved edition was made on unknown date (Showa era) by famous publisher "Takamizawa". Title "Seiro Geisha sen (Selected Geisha at Seiro, Yoshiwara)- Itsutomi (Geisha's name)" in upper right image. "Eishi-zu" (means painted by Eishi) and 2 black seals in left of image. Paper size is 10 and 5/8 inches by 15 and 5/8 inches. Genuine Japanese handmade woodblock print. Excellent condition. Very slight mat burn into image which is easily mat out. Lightly tipped to backing paper which written "EISHI (1756 -1829), BEAUTY AND SHAMISEN" by pencil.

"Hanmoto, Takamizawa -ban" (Publisher, Takamizawa) red seal and "Tokyo Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan zou" (means This print original is at The Tokyo National Museum) black stamp on the verso. An excellent sophisticated print to display. 

Chobunsai Eishi (1756 – 1829) was a hatamoto (direct retainer of a shogun) with 500 koku (a unit of volume: 1 koku equals to approximately 180 liters; koku is used here as a unit of the stipends samurai received from a shogun) and a disciple of Kano Eisenin (Michinobu). Having learned the painting style of Torii Kiyonaga, he drew tall beautiful women and established his position as a bijinga (paintings depicting the beauty of women) artist rivaling Utamaro. While most of his works are nikuhitsuga (a painting done with a brush and colored ink on paper, not a woodblock print), he also produced some quality woodblock prints like this one.
From the titles, these prints seem to depict harlots of Yoshiwara. Based on the black mica series of three prints, "Seiro-bisen-awase," published by the same publisher, Iwatoya, it is assumed that these prints used to constitute a series of three white mica prints, where the two pictures, "Itsuhana" and "Ohane & Ofuku," were linked to each other via shamisen and the "Itsutomi" was placed next to them (it is not known whether it was placed on the right-hand side or the left-hand side of the other two). Based on the period when geisha women were popular and the printing style, it has been ascertained that this was created during the Kansei era (1789 – 1801). While the slender figures represented rather linearly are slightly rigid and simple in expression with little movement, they clearly demonstrate the characteristics of Eishi, who focused on the combined expression of buxomness and pureness and had some impact on Kitagawa Utamaro, an artist of the same period.




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