Ariwara no Narihira, from the series "Fashionable Children as the Six Immortal Poets (Furyu kodakara rokkasen)"

This Art Institute of Chicago oban, dated c. 1814/17, belongs to one of Eizan's most charming conceits: "Fashionable Children as the Six Immortal Poets (Furyu kodakara rokkasen)." The Rokkasen were the six classical waka poets canonized in the preface to the tenth-century Kokin Wakashu — Ariwara no Narihira, Ono no Komachi, Sojo Henjo, Bunya no Yasuhide, Kisen Hoshi, and Otomo no Kuronushi. By the late Edo period the set had become so iconic that designers regularly recast it in modern guise, and Eizan's version transforms the six immortal poets into Edo children at play, each child posed and costumed to evoke its poetic counterpart. The Narihira sheet identifies its child with the great Heian aristocrat-lover, the protagonist of "Tales of Ise." The series gave Eizan room to combine bijin-ga elegance with the picture-book charm of child subjects — a softer register from his courtesan portraits, and one that broadened his market.