Beauty at the Garden Well

A bijin at the garden well — a classic bijin-ga compositional setting where a beautiful woman performs the practical task of drawing water, the stone well, its wooden bucket and rope, and the surrounding garden providing picturesque context. The garden well (tsurube) is an image with literary resonance in Japanese culture, associated with the waka poem by Kaga no Chiyo about a morning glory vine wound around the well rope. Hanko's woman at the well brings this literary tradition into his refined Meiji figure style.