Onna Chōhōki (Illustrated Handbook for Daily Life for Women)

Held by the Art Institute of Chicago in the Martin A. Ryerson Collection, this woodblock-printed book of 1847, titled Onna Chōhōki or Illustrated Handbook for Daily Life for Women, is the principal surviving book project securely attributed to Katsushika Ōi as sole illustrator. The genre of onna chōhōki, a kind of practical compendium addressed to women on matters of household management, etiquette, fashion, and self-presentation, had been established in the early Edo period and reissued for two centuries before Ōi gave it her own pictorial update. Her illustrations modernize the visual vocabulary of the volume to suit mid-nineteenth-century tastes, with the fashions of the late [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga) used to present hairstyles, kimono arrangements, and accessories for a contemporary female reader. The book is unusual within Ōi's oeuvre for carrying her single signature rather than appearing under her father's name or that of the broader Hokusai workshop, and for that reason it has long served as one of the firmest anchors in any reconstruction of her independent practice. The Art Institute's holding situates her within the same printed-book tradition that produced the great Hokusai manga and confirms her presence in the published as well as the painted record of late Edo ukiyo-e.