Toyohara Kunichika. A Collection of Imagined Beauties / Fan print, 1871.

Artist: Toyohara Kunichika (豊原国周, 1835–1900), a.k.a. Arakawa Yasohachi (荒川 八十八)

Signed: Kunichika hitsu (國周筆)

Publisher: Iseya Sōemon [伊勢屋惣右衛門] (Japanese, 1776 – 1862); seal: Ue, Isesō, Hori Ni, hanmoto (上　伊勢惣　堀二　板元)

Date-censor seal: Year of the Goat plus Kiwame (未極), Meiji 4, 1871

Media: Aiban yoko-e uchiwa-e (合判横絵団扇絵); Fan print, color woodblock print, 231 x 290 mm

Series: A Collection of Imagined Bijin (Bijin kasō awase, 美人花草合)

A cut-out print depicting two women in a domestic setting. The woman on the left wears a blue kimono with pine and hawk motifs and a red scarf and holds a green uchiwa fan. The woman on the right—dressed in a purple-striped kimono decorated with various family crests—is shown wringing out a cloth. Behind them are a folding fan with birds and grasses and a red textile patterned with asanoha. A yellow cartouche at the upper right resembles a folded paper slip on which the series title and individual scene title are written. The series is likely titled A Collection of Imagined Bijin (Bijin kasō awase, 美人花草合); the remaining inscription could not be securely deciphered.

[Thanks to Horst Graebner of Kunisada Project].