Bathing boys

Bathing boys depicts a genre subject — children at water — that connects to a longer tradition of seasonal figure prints associated with summer leisure. Within Kamei's body of work, this subject moves outside the [meisho-e](/glossary/meisho-e) (famous places) landscape format that dominated [shin-hanga](/glossary/shin-hanga) commercial production and into figural genre territory more often handled by [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) specialists than by his generation of landscape designers. The numbered title suggesting it is the second in a paired set indicates a sustained compositional study of the same subject, possibly varying viewpoint, group arrangement, or setting between prints. Mokuhanga handles water through carved patterning in the keyblock combined with [bokashi](/glossary/bokashi) gradation in the printing, while figures require separate blocks for skin tones, hair, and any clothing or wraps. Kamei's print likely frames the children within a partial landscape setting — riverbank, pool, or coastal shallows — that situates the figural action within the kind of natural environment his landscape practice would have made familiar territory. The work represents the broader thematic range of mid-century shin-hanga production, where individual artists pursued figure and genre subjects alongside the publisher-driven landscape commissions.