A Parade of Courtesans

Dated circa 1690 and held in the Art Institute of Chicago, A Parade of Courtesans is a sumizuri-e print in the elongated kakemono yoko-e format, an exceptionally horizontal proportion that suited the procession-like organization of the Yoshiwara oiran dochu, the formal promenade of high-ranking courtesans. The oiran dochu was one of the great public spectacles of the Yoshiwara, in which a procession of senior courtesans, attended by their kamuro (child attendants), shinzo (apprentice courtesans), and male attendants, paraded through the streets of the pleasure quarter in elaborate finery. Moronobu's composition uses the long horizontal format to arrange the procession across the picture plane, with each figure rendered in characteristic detail, the patterns of the courtesans' multiple layered robes, the carefully ornamented hair, the height of their towering geta, all serving as visual documentation of the latest Yoshiwara fashion. Printed in single-block black ink, the work demonstrates how Moronobu could organize a procession of figures into a coherent compositional whole through his command of line, spacing, and silhouette. The print contributed directly to the iconographic tradition of oiran dochu imagery that would continue through Moronobu's successors for two centuries.