Set of Three Hanging Scrolls, Day Dream Plays (Kakemono sampukutsui utsusu no asobi)

This uncut hosoban triptych benizuri-e in the Art Institute of Chicago, dated to about 1755, presents Set of Three Hanging Scrolls, Day Dream Plays (Kakemono sampukutsui utsusu no asobi), one of Shigenaga's most ambitious late designs. The triptych is composed as if it were a set of three hanging scrolls (kakemono) displayed together, a self-reflexive conceit in which the print imitates the format of the painted scroll while remaining a printed multiple. Day Dream Plays (utsusu no asobi) is a phrase that suggests the imagined or insubstantial pleasures of the floating world, and the figures depicted are bijin engaged in pastimes that could be read either literally or as oneiric tableaux. The benizuri-e palette of two or three printed colors marks the work as part of Shigenaga's latest production, made within a year of his death and contemporary with the work of Toyonobu, Kiyomitsu, and the very young Harunobu. That the Chicago sheet is preserved uncut is significant: triptychs were normally divided for display, and the uncut state documents Shigenaga's original composition as a unified field. The print is among his late masterpieces.