Writing a Note

"Writing a Note" from the early 1890s depicts a woman in the act of writing — the calligraphic brush stroke, the formal arrangement of the writing materials (ink stone, water dropper, paper), the specific posture of a person bent over correspondence. Writing was a valued feminine accomplishment in Meiji Japan, and the scene of a woman writing a letter or note carried implications of education, refinement, and social engagement. Shuntei renders the specific quality of absorbed concentration that the careful formation of calligraphic characters required.