Combinh her ahir

The subject of a woman combing her hair has a long history in Japanese woodblock printmaking, treated by ukiyo-e artists from Utamaro onward and continued in shin-hanga by Hashiguchi Goyo and Ito Shinsui. The title indicates a bijin-ga showing a figure at her toilette, a theme that allows the printmaker to render the long black hair, the nape of the neck, and the loose kimono in close intimate detail. Such a composition typically relies on bokashi gradation to suggest the depth and weight of the hair, careful keyblock cutting for the strands at the temples and forehead, and a quiet ground that throws the figure into relief. If attributed to Shunsen, the print stands apart from the yakusha-e portraits that occupy the bulk of his output, indicating the broader range of subject matter that the Watanabe shin-hanga programme occasionally accommodated. The technical execution, even on a non-actor subject, would still draw on the same workshop of carvers and printers responsible for the Shin Nigao series and Shunsen's other actor portraits.