"Wa": Young Grass, from the series "Tales of Ise in Fashionable Brocade Pictures (Furyu nishiki-e Ise monogatari)"

This Katsukawa Shunsho print, issued around 1767 in the series Furyu nishiki-e Ise monogatari, illustrates a young grass theme keyed to the syllable wa within the iroha sequence governing the series. The image evokes the wakana, or young greens, motif rooted in classical Japanese poetry, where the spring gathering of fresh shoots served as a metaphor for youthful renewal and amorous longing. The original Tales of Ise episode draws on this poetic convention, and Shunsho transposes it into Edo period dress and setting through the mitate strategy by which ukiyo-e artists routinely re-clothed classical subjects in contemporary guise. The figures are rendered with the elegant elongated proportions characteristic of late 1760s bijinga, their robes patterned with seasonal motifs that reinforce the poem's evocation of early spring. While Shunsho is most closely identified with yakusha-e and the founding of the Katsukawa school, his bijinga production demonstrates his fluency across the principal Edo ukiyo-e genres of his day, and the Tales of Ise series shows how he engaged with the literary sophistication then fashionable in Edo print culture. This impression is held by the Art Institute of Chicago. The print contributes to a fuller understanding of Shunsho's range and illustrates the elegant fusion of classical poetic reference and contemporary fashion that distinguished some of the most ambitious nishiki-e productions of the late 1760s, when the technology of full-color printing was still relatively new and rapidly maturing.