An Arrangement of Morning Glories

An Arrangement of Morning Glories, dated 1791 and held in the Art Institute of Chicago, is a finely observed flower print by Kitagawa Utamaro that complements his better-known portraits of Edo bijin-ga. Morning glories (asagao) bloomed at the height of summer in eighteenth-century Edo and were the subject of intense connoisseurship, with townsmen cultivating exotic varieties and gathering in early-morning shows to compare specimens. In this print, the artist composes a single arrangement of asagao, balancing the twining vines, heart-shaped leaves, and trumpet-like flowers against an open ground that focuses attention on the plant's structural rhythms. Subtle color gradations within the petals, ranging from clear blue to softer mauve and white, suggest the early-morning translucence of the blooms, and the leaves' veining is drawn with the kind of precise keyblock work normally reserved for textile patterns. The plant's vertical reach gives the image a strong central axis, while small downward-turning blossoms create syncopated rests in the composition. As an exercise in restrained ukiyo-e design, the print reflects Utamaro's regular collaboration with kyoka poets and surimono enthusiasts who prized close observation of seasonal flowers. Within the Art Institute of Chicago's collection, this Kitagawa Utamaro print provides a strong example of how the artist could move from the human face to a single climbing vine without loss of conceptual coherence, demonstrating the breadth of late-eighteenth-century ukiyo-e beyond the categorical boundaries of bijin-ga.