Hazuki 葉月 / Bijin juni sugata 美人十二姿

Hazuki, the eighth lunar month, marks the beginning of autumn in the Japanese calendar and within Migita Toshihide's Bijin juni sugata (Twelve Aspects of Beautiful Women) it cues a shift from summer translucency to denser textile pattern. The series, twelve sheets in all, allowed Toshihide to demonstrate his command of seasonal bijinga at a moment when senso-e battle prints dominated his output. As a Yoshitoshi student, he brought to Meiji prints in this genre a careful sense of proportion and an avoidance of caricature, which set him apart from some of his more theatrical contemporaries. The British Museum holds an impression of this sheet and its cataloguing supports the entry on [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e).org, where the design appears in the institution's open files. Hazuki imagery often nods to the moon-viewing customs of autumn and to the early stirrings of the harvest, and Toshihide's choice of motifs on the kimono, the obi knot, and the woman's posture can be read against those seasonal markers. The vertical format and the spare ground are consistent across the series, which gives the run its visual coherence when twelve sheets are seen together. Within Toshihide's career, Bijin juni sugata represents the steady commercial bijinga work that ran alongside his wartime reportage and his historical subjects, demonstrating the breadth required of a successful Meiji designer working for Tokyo publishers.