
The Courtesan Toji of the Ogiya with Her Attendants Satoji and Uraji, from the series "Models for Fashion: New Designs as Fresh as Young Leaves" (Hinagata wakana no hatsu moyo)
- Date:
- 1784
- Medium:
- Color woodblock print; ōban
- Source:
- Art Institute of Chicago
Description
The Courtesan Toji of the Ogiya with Her Attendants Satoji and Uraji, from the series Models for Fashion: New Designs as Fresh as Young Leaves (Hinagata wakana no hatsu moyo), is a 1776 Torii Kiyonaga print from one of the most consequential courtesan-portrait series of the eighteenth century. The Hinagata wakana no hatsu moyo project documented the leading oiran of named Yoshiwara establishments alongside their kamuro child attendants, recording the kimono patterns each season presented as the latest fashion — the prints functioned simultaneously as celebrity portraits, fashion plates, and quarter advertising. Toji of the Ogiya is shown with Satoji and Uraji, the matching shinzo or kamuro names supplying the layered identification typical of the genre. Kiyonaga's contribution to the series was sustained over several years, and across the run he refined the format that would underwrite his great large-format Yoshiwara processionals of the early 1780s. The project also illustrates how the Torii school under his leadership coordinated with leading publishers to produce extended [bijin-ga](/glossary/bijin-ga) sets, extending the studio's reach well beyond the kabuki-signboard work that had been its earlier mainstay. The Art Institute of Chicago records this impression among its Kiyonaga Hinagata holdings, where it stands as a representative installment of the series.



