from the series One Hundred Pictures by Kyôsai (Kyôsai hyakuzu)

This print from the Kyosai hyakuzu is among the later numbered sheets in an anthology that covers the full range of Kyosai's subject matter. The hyakuzu's organizing principle was comprehensiveness rather than thematic coherence, and the effect across the full series is of a single artistic mind in dialogue with the entirety of Japanese visual and literary tradition. This sheet may depict a landscape or architectural subject — a category less central to Kyosai's output than figure painting but present in his oeuvre through associations with meisho-e conventions and Chinese literati painting. Alternatively, it may take up a literary subject from classical Japanese or Chinese sources, rendered with the compressed narrative legibility that Kyosai brought to even obscure textual references. The composition on washi uses multiple woodblocks for color separation, with the figure — if present — rendered in a dark ink that preserves the calligraphic quality of Kyosai's original brushstroke.