Tatsumi Roko, from the series “Renowned Beauties Likened to the Six Immortal Poets" ("Komei bijin rokkasen")

Kitagawa Utamaro's Tatsumi Roko, from the series Renowned Beauties Likened to the Six Immortal Poets (Komei bijin rokkasen), is held by the Art Institute of Chicago (artwork 26786). The series is one of Utamaro's signal contributions to the mitate-rokkasen tradition, in which the canonical rokkasen, the Six Immortal Poets of Heian-period waka, supply a literary frame for portraits of contemporary Edo beauties. By titling the series Komei bijin rokkasen, renowned beauties likened to the immortal poets, Utamaro and his publisher commit to identifying six specific celebrated women rather than generic types, and to giving each woman the dignity of a classical poetic counterpart. Tatsumi Roko was a celebrated geisha of the Tatsumi district, the so-called Fukagawa quarter southeast of Edo's center, an unlicensed but extremely popular entertainment district whose geisha rivaled and sometimes surpassed Yoshiwara stars in fashionability. Her appearance here as one of the six immortal beauties signals Utamaro's willingness to look beyond the official Yoshiwara to other corners of Edo's female celebrity culture. Stylistically the print is one of Utamaro's mature okubi-e half-length portraits, with the figure dominating the sheet and her face presented with the precision and individuality that distinguish his named portraits from generic bijin types. Hair ornaments, collar, and patterned textile complete the visual identification. The Art Institute of Chicago's holding preserves an important reference example of the Komei bijin rokkasen, a series that historians of [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) cite as central evidence for the celebrity culture of late eighteenth-century Edo, and for Utamaro's role in shaping that culture through the named portrait.