Rikuseki (Lu Ji)

Toyohara Chikanobu's 1887 woodblock print *Rikuseki (Lu Ji)* centers on a woman in a pale-blue kimono patterned with small roundels and lined in red and purple, who rests a hand on the head of a small grey-haired figure in an olive-green robe; the figure looks up at her, holding a bulging red drawstring pouch, while two round orange fruits lie on the pale green floor nearby. They stand against a graduated peach-orange ground beside a blue-and-white vase of red and pink peonies and a small cartouche containing a monochrome ink landscape with columns of Japanese text. Above, a narrow register bordered in red-and-green scrollwork shows a figure bowing beside a bonsai in an interior that opens onto a rocky garden where a bearded man in a mauve floral robe and pale-blue headcloth sits near broad palm leaves, with the artist's signature and red seal at lower right of the main scene.