Bellflowers (Asagao), from the series Genji in Fashionable Modern Guise (Fūryū yatsushi Genji: Asagao)
- Date:
- 1789–92
- Medium:
- Triptych of woodblock prints; ink and color on paper
- Source:
- Metropolitan Museum of Art
Issued in 1789, this Chobunsai Eishi design belongs to Furyu yatsushi Genji, a series that mitate-styled chapters of Murasaki Shikibu's Tale of Genji as scenes from contemporary Edo life. The sheet represents the Asagao, or Bellflowers, chapter, in which Prince Genji courts the cool, unyielding Princess Asagao. Rather than illustrating the eleventh-century narrative directly, Eishi assembles fashionable Edo women whose bearing and accessories allude to the chapter's themes of restrained longing. As a Kano-trained [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) artist, Eishi gave such literary subjects the sort of compositional dignity normally reserved for ink painting commissions: the figures occupy a generous expanse of paper, their robes falling in long, evenly described lines, and an attribute such as the bellflower itself functions as a learned visual footnote. The print is characteristic of his Edo [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga) at the close of the Tenmei era, when his work began circulating widely among educated patrons who appreciated the classical allusions. The palette is light and silvery, with soft greys, pale blues, and warm white grounds rather than the saturated mineral pigments common in earlier ukiyo-e. The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds an impression of the sheet, accessioned and documented in the online collection under search 55746, where it is identified with its Furyu yatsushi Genji series and the Asagao chapter. The print exemplifies Eishi's signature blend of Heian literary culture and Edo modish display, a combination that helped redefine the bijin-ga genre during the late eighteenth century.
c. 1790
Color woodblock print; oban
c. 1789/95
Color woodblock print; right sheet of oban triptych
c. 1791/92
Color woodblock print; chuban
c. 1793
Color woodblock print; oban
Bellflowers (Asagao), from the series Genji in Fashionable Modern Guise (Fūryū yatsushi Genji: Asagao) was created by Chōbunsai Eishi (鳥文斎栄之) in 1789–92.
Bellflowers (Asagao), from the series Genji in Fashionable Modern Guise (Fūryū yatsushi Genji: Asagao) depicts birds & flowers.
