Young Woman Holding Parasol Admires Hirugao (noon-face) Flowers

Isoda Koryusai's Young Woman Holding Parasol Admires Hirugao (noon-face) Flowers, dated 1767 and held by the Art Institute of Chicago, weds a single elegant figure to a quiet floral motif in the gentle key that characterizes his early Edo bijin-ga. The young woman pauses beneath her parasol to gaze at hirugao — the noon-face or wild morning glory — a summer wildflower whose name carries delicate poetic resonance in classical Japanese verse. Koryusai aligns the curve of the parasol, the descending arc of her sleeve, and the tilt of her head in a single graceful sweep, while the small white-and-pink hirugao blossoms anchor the composition near her feet. The pairing of woman and seasonal plant follows the deep tradition of bijin-ga floral attribution, in which the temperament or beauty of the figure is amplified by association with a specific botanical sign. Koryusai handles the type with restraint: there is no extravagant kimono pattern or theatrical pose, only a finely judged contour and a measured color register. This understated approach to seasonal bijin-ga prefigures the more developed seasonal cycles he would design in the following years, and it shares a fundamental sensibility with the courtesan-and-textile attention of his Hinagata Wakana no Hatsumoyo series. The parasol does double duty as a decorative form and a screen that frames the woman's profile, allowing the viewer to read both her face and the broad disc of the parasol as elements of a single design. As a quiet study in figure and flower, the print preserves the lyrical poise that defined the early phase of Koryusai's career.