Description
Yamauba sits in a loose pale robe while Kintoki climbs over her shoulder as she combs her hair. Their close arrangement brings adult and child together around an ordinary act of grooming. Kitagawa Utamaro gives the legendary pair the immediacy of daily life, allowing bodily proximity and a familiar gesture to make the imaginative subject approachable.
Dating to around 1801, the woodblock print uses ink and color on paper. It gives a brief bodily routine a continuing visual form within a named imaginative subject. The work’s interest lies in that combination, where the familiar and legendary meet without requiring an invented episode from a larger story or a symbolic explanation to make the pair’s interaction engaging.
Read our guide to giclée prints or browse the Kitagawa Utamaro collection.
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