「応需暁斎楽画」 「第十号」

The tenth number in the Kyosai Rakuga series lacks a surviving descriptive subtitle in its title inscription, making precise identification of subject matter dependent on visual examination. Within the sequence, number ten falls between the Aesop's fables adaptations of numbers six and eight and the Jigoku Dayu dream scene of number nine, suggesting the series at this point was alternating between imported Western narrative subjects and subjects from Japanese tradition. The Rakuga prints consistently maintain a distinctive graphic character: loose, brush-informed outlines translated into woodblock with minimal reformatting, flat or simply graded color areas, and a compositional economy that privileges gesture and expression over elaborate decorative detail. This approach contrasts sharply with the commercial nishiki-e mainstream of the period and reflects Kyosai's resistance to the division between painting and printmaking that had increasingly separated those arts in the preceding century.