Old Woman on the Clouds

This woodblock print depicts an elderly woman borne aloft on clouds, a subject strikingly at odds with conventional print imagery of the period. The aged female figure likely draws on the archetype of Yamauba or similar folkloric crones who inhabit liminal spaces between the human and spirit worlds. Usen's rural upbringing in Ushiku, Ibaraki — where folk beliefs remained vital — provided direct imaginative material for such subjects. The composition relies on the contrast between the woman's earthbound physicality and the ethereal medium carrying her, a tension rendered through the opposition of dense figural brushwork and lighter, more diffuse cloud passages. This is the primary print in what appears to be a series of four related variants on the same subject.