Uma Ōji

From Yajima Gōgaku's twelve-month zodiac-and-place series, this sheet associates the horse (uma) with Ōji, the wooded northern district of Edo famous for the Ōji Inari shrine and the great Fox Fires gathering on New Year's Eve. The horse-Ōji pairing draws on the long-standing connection between Inari worship and horse offerings, and on the busy seasonal traffic of pilgrims and travellers that filled the post-station road north toward Nikkō. Gōgaku renders the scene in the muted nanga palette and loose calligraphic line that distinguished his literati style from contemporary ukiyo-e, with the open composition and exploited negative space that bunjinga theorists associated with atmospheric breath. The small colour woodcut, roughly 21 by 19 centimetres, was issued between 1818 and 1830.