Bunraku Puppetry from the series Competition of Precious Children Proud of their Arts, Among Seven Scrolls

Bunraku Puppetry from the series Competition of Precious Children Proud of their Arts, Among Seven Scrolls, designed by Kitagawa Utamaro around 1805 and held by the Cleveland Museum of Art, brings together the artist's interest in children, women, and the popular theater. The series casts plump Edo infants in the roles of competitors showing off their accomplishments across seven types of art, watched and assisted by women whose Edo bijin-ga elegance frames each scene. In this sheet, a child mimics or operates a bunraku puppet, a delightful conceit because the bunraku puppet itself is an art object handled by adult puppeteers; the child stands in their place, miniature puppet master holding miniature puppet, while a fashionable woman attends. Utamaro's late drawing of children is among the great pleasures of ukiyo-e, the rounded forms and unselfconscious gestures contrasting beautifully with the careful adult bodies. The series belongs to a broader thread in Edo print culture in which children's activities were viewed both with sentiment and as miniature versions of adult endeavors. The printing handles the bunraku doll, the child, and the attendant woman with distinct line weights, signaling their different ontologies within the same image. For collectors of Kitagawa Utamaro and admirers of late ukiyo-e domestic series, the Cleveland Museum of Art impression is a particularly vivid example of his 1805 manner.